Birders Rest & Kiwi tours

Birders Rest offers visitors quality accommodation in attractive garden surroundings coupled with trips to see local birds. Our speciality is our night tour to see North Island Brown Kiwi with a very high success rate.

Kiwi are notoriously difficult to see but although they are traditionally native forest birds, some local sites are in open fields & paddocks with scattered patches of bush & in such habitat, sightings are more reliable. Although not guaranteed, we now manage to see at least one  Kiwi on nearly all our visits.

  Other interesting native birds in our area include Fernbird, Tomtit, New Zealand Dotterel, Wrybill, Royal Spoonbill, New Zealand Dabchick, Australian Little Grebe & Australasian Bittern. Fernbirds are widespread in New Zealand but hard to see; a riverside swamp near us has a high population of them & they can usually be called into view. New Zealand Dotterels and Wrybills are locally common on Far North beaches, some of the many dune lakes north of here have both New Zealand Dabchicks and Australian Little Grebes. There are still patches of native forest where Tomtits, North Island Robin and occasionally Kokako can be seen. Visitors driving to Kerikeri can incorporate a detour to Waipu to look for the rare Fairy Tern & to Teal Bay, a reliable site for wild Brown Teal.

Since 2010 we have run day pelagic tours from Whangaroa Harbour, half an hour’s drive from here. In 3 or 4 trips a year since then we have recorded 28 tubenose species including 5 species of albatross, Black-winged, White-naped, Pycroft’s & Kermadec Petrels, Wedge-tailed Shearwater and regular New Zealand Storm Petrel; also Grey Ternlet & South Polar Skua.

Detlef has published an illustrated site guide to the Far North region which is available through us or from retail outlets in New Zealand, Australia & the UK.  

We have 2 self-contained units attached to the house, these have en-suite bathrooms & kitchenette, one has a queen-size bed & the other 2 single beds. There is also a spare en-suite room in the main house. Our price includes a ‘continental’ style breakfast. There is access to the deck & garden (for which the bird list is 42) & a swimming pool. There are a number of other activities available for visitors to the Bay of Islands such as sailing, kayaking, fishing, scuba diving & tramping.

Please contact us for prices & availability

Birders Rest & Kiwi tours Contact Details