My story of the black robin began when I met Don Merton in the early 1990s. He is quiet and soft-spoken and, like so many people who have accomplished extraordinary things, he is modest. Don had been invited to a reception held to welcome me to New Zealand, and we were not able to talk long. But he gave me a glimpse of the fascinating work he did, and his passion for saving endangered birds. The rest I have learned from subsequent chats on the telephone and e-mail correspondence. And of course, from reading about his work.
His love affair with wildlife began in the 1940s when he was a small child, growing up on the east coast of New Zealand’s North Island. “From the age of about four years,” Don told me, “I was nutty about wildlife and spent much time watching birds, lizards, and insects—especially looking for birds’ nests.” When he was five years old, his grandmother came to stay and brought with her a canary. “That little yellow bird sang its way through the 1940s and… ignited my passion for birds,” Don said. One day he and his brothers “gave my grandmother’s canary a (European) goldfinch chick to foster. It adopted the chick as its own and raised it.” Thirty-five years later, his recollection of this incident eventually saved the black robin species from imminent extinction. (I shall tell more about that later.)
He was twelve years old when he made the decision to devote his life to trying to save birds that were in danger of extinction. And he certainly followed his dream, beginning his career in 1960 (the same year that I arrived at Gombe National Park in Tanzania) and playing a key role in the rescue and recovery of some of his country’s—and the world’s—most endangered birds. It all began in 1961 when he spent a month on Big South Cape Island—now known by its indigenous name Taukihepa (off the southwest coast of New Zealand’s Stewart Island)—which still retained its full quota of indigenous wildlife. Indeed, along with two other tiny adjacent islands, it was the final refuge for several animals formerly abundant and widespread on the mainland, including the South Island saddleback.