Description
Whenua Hou Codfish Island, largest of Rakiura’s satellite islands, is best known as a wildlife sanctuary, with kākāpō, the critically endangered parrot, centre stage. But the Foveaux Strait island has an even greater claim to fame – as the first foothold of bicultural Aotearoa New Zealand 200 years ago. From the early 1800s, European sealers and their Māori wives were raising families on the island, which the sealers knew as Codfish. It gained another name as a result of the mixed-race settlement: Whenua Hou, New Land.
