Casting a Torchlight on Sonia Rahiti

Nā Tina Nixon

The Shangri La, owned by Rewi Bull - taking tītī birders to the island since - forever!

For 56 years Sonia Rahiti has been going to the Tītī Islands for the birding season. Her whānau has a house at Murderers Cove, on the south-east side of Taukihepa (Big South Cape Island), which is an island to the west of the southern tip of Rakiura.

Sonia is married to Emil, and they have a daughter, Kea Moana. The tītī harvest has brought families like hers together every year for generations. “We are a lot more spread out than we used to be,” says Sonia. “‘But I can’t think of another event which has the power to make people put their working lives and their differences aside and come together for eleven-and-a-half weeks every year.”

At the end of a season, the emotions running through Sonia are hard to capture on paper. When the time comes to return home, the families gather on the beach to board their boats.

“We begin to feel a sense of sadness,” Sonia says, “which I can only describe as being like a powerful feeling of homesickness. And we haven’t even left the island yet.”

When she returns to the mainland, she continues to feel a sense of disconnection from the island. “I avoid people for the first few days back home because I find my experiences on the manu too hard to convey to those who have never had the privilege to partake.”

Sonia’s bloodline comes from the Cleaver and Kini whānau, thus she affiliates to several manu. Her mother, Dale Cleaver (daughter of George Cleaver and Martha Kini), has two rights to the tītī islands. Her father, Ronnie Bull (son of Freda and Jim Bull, descendant of Rewiti Te Akau), has another.

Sonia’s family has a four-bedroom home on Taukihepa. Her sister, Moana, has a three-bedroom house there too. Last year, 13 members of Sonia’s family stayed in her house, and five stayed at her sister's. Her brother, Ranui, plans to build a third house there next year to help accommodate the growing number of “little people” who now make the trip over. A separate “workhouse” is close by, which the whānau make use of together.

Sonia comes from a fishing whānau. Each season they are transported to the islands on her brother Rewi Bull’s commercial boat, the Shangri La. However, not that long ago families used to go for weeks without seeing a boat. “Back when my parents were young, the food top-ups came from weka roaming the island, which they’d catch and eat. Their other source of sustenance was, of course, readily available kaimoana including pāua, crays and kina. Now there is the privilege of being able to replenish stores during each stay, because Rewi returns from Bluff to Big South Cape from time to time to bring back food and fuel.”

Sonia (far right) and whānau.

Weka were brought to the tītī islands intentionally as a food source for whānau. They are now a threat to the tītī, and it’s estimated weka are responsible for killing up to 10 per cent of the tītī population.

The birds are now being targeted as part of the island’s pest management programmes.

Tītī have historically been caught during the daytime, (nanao) using hooks and hands to remove them from their burrows. Nanao is not so common now. “People have work commitments now; they can’t necessarily take two or three months off.” And the birders are getting older and are not so keen on lying on the ground and reaching into burrows.

Now, tītī are mostly hunted on dark nights using torches, a method known as rama. This is when the chicks emerge in the dark to flex their wings and get ready to leave the nest.

Seasons are variable. The last three seasons have been good for Sonia and her whānau, “tītī are coming back in good numbers.” But before this, her family had nearly 10 years of bad birding. Sonia’s family regulate their tītī quota based on their own harvest numbers and on their observations from previous seasons. They are very aware of the importance of sustainability. “Because there are so many of us, we’ve made the decision to effectively cut our harvest in half.”

Sonia has been involved with tītī islands research for many years, working alongside ecologist Henrik Moller, who started the original research on tītī. His leadership has had her, and teams of field workers participate in dissections of tītī, collecting tītī samples, tītī transit methods and burrow scoping exercises.

“I have learnt so much about the science relating to the tītī population from Henrik’s leadership,” she says.

Pest control work on Taukihepa is done by multiple families and the Department of Conservation (DOC). They have identified several reasons for tītī population decline in recent years. Rats and weka eat large numbers of tītī eggs and young birds.

But commercial fishing by Japanese trawlers has also had an impact. These vessels have reportedly been responsible for killing millions of tītī as a by-catch. In addition, Japanese squid boats, which have been known to fish very close to shore, have interfered with rama.

Sonia recalls seasons where torches were not needed at night because lights from the squid boats would illuminate the beaches and forest. There is also strong evidence climate has affected the tītī population. A decline in their numbers has been linked by scientists to El Niño weather events.

When asked about her vision for the future of the islands, Sonia believes making them predator-free is an achievable goal. Pest control successes continue to be reported as the Rakiura community works together to restore the island’s natural haven. “Predator-Free Rakiura is providing hope for our islands, especially the islands which lie closest
to it,” she says.

But there are big challenges to achieving that goal. Sonia’s view is that to get the islands back to where they were, we need to get rid of rats and weka. “But weka are clever. A single weka on Codfish Island confounded pest eradication experts for a long time before it was discovered it was swimming to and from the island at low tide. And rats are relentless.”

Removing pests completely from the tītī islands is, Sonia admits, a courageous and ambitious goal. But through continued research and pest control programmes, supported by like-minded whānau and dedicated birders like Sonia, the possibility remains that one day nature on the tītī islands will thrive again.