Nestling mortality in a reintroduced population of the endangered and endemic hihi/stitchbird (Notiomystis cincta) was investigated over one breeding season (2008-09) at Zealandia – Karori Sanctuary, New Zealand, to determine whether disease impacted on nestling survival. High rates of both hatching failure (56%) and nestling mortality (39%) in the first clutch made this the least successful breeding season since translocation in 2005. Overall 34% of eggs survived to fledge, compared to 52% and 58% in 2005-06 and 2006-07 respectively. Samples collected from 34 live and 25 dead nestlings were screened for evidence of disease. Bacterial and fungal pathogens were isolated from gastrointestinal swabs but there was no evidence of coccidia or other intestinal parasites in faecal samples. There was no evidence of significant abnormalities in the blood collected from hihi prior to fledging in the haematological parameters tested, and all blood samples were negative for malarial parasites. Tropical fowl mites (Ornithonyssus bursa) were found on nestlings and recovered from nest material in very small numbers. Sixty percent of nestling mortality occurred during the first 7 days of life, most often caused by starvation (16%) or poor pulmonary aeration (20%), and death was associated with seasonally low minimum daily temperatures below 11oC. Two older nestlings that died suffered from aspergillosis and an unidentified haemoparasite respectively. Seven nestlings (28%) aged 6-19 days died as a consequence of ventriculitis due to traumatic penetration by insect remnants identified as bee or wasp stings (Hymenoptera). The resulting granulomatous lesions were found in the gizzard mucosa, muscle layers and ventricular or intestinal serosa, and were associated with bacterial and/or yeast secondary infection. It was concluded that hihi may lack the evolutionary adaptations to safely consume introduced bees (Apis mellifera) and wasps (Vespula germanica, V. vulgaris) that are attracted to the feeding stations used to support reintroduced hihi populations. Histopathological examination showed candidiasis contributed to the deaths of four nestlings and Candida albicans was isolated from the gastrointestinal swabs of 13 live nestlings from four nest sites, eight of which survived to fledge. The potential of all pathogens may be increased by any cause of temporary or permanent immunosuppression and, in this establishing population, the majority of nestling deaths were associated with environmental conditions (temperature) and ecological factors (introduced prey). It is suggested that ongoing monitoring should include use of temperature data-loggers in hihi nest boxes, health screening of live nestlings, necropsy examination of dead birds, and spore counts to determine environmental levels of Aspergillus. Nest box insulation and/or heating could reduce the incidence of hypothermia in nestlings. A review of the carbohydrate provisioning protocols may reduce bee/wasp numbers and minimise the effect of Candida albicans at this site.

Wind is the second largest renewable energy source after solar. It is one of the fastest growing sources of electricity in the world and currently of wind energy is installed in the United States and an additional is under construction (Office of Energy and Environment Affairs, 2011). For the growth of wind electricity, one of the most prominent environmental concerns relates to the death of birds, bats and other avian species resulting from collision with turbine blades. This thesis develops a model that provides the optimal strategy of turning the turbines off in a wind farm for certain periods to mitigate bird mortalities. We first create a single turbine optimization model for each hour on each day of a single month. We maximize the expected revenue generation and limit the expected bird mortalities to a certain level to solve for the dates and times for which the turbine should be turned off. The optimization problem is found to be part of common class of problems called Knapsack problems and through experiments we conclude that a linear programming (LP) relaxation of the problem provides a near-optimal solution. We extend the single-turbine model to a multiple-turbine model applicable to a wind farm. In this case, we solve for the percentage of wind turbines that should be turned off to limit the expected bird mortalities to a certain level. Finally, we carry out an uncertainty analysis and estimate probability distributions over the outcome of optimal strategy of turning the turbine off. We consider the Cape Wind project as a case study and limit the analysis to only one species of endangered birds called the common loon. We find that in order to save an expected number of 10 such birds in the month of March; we need to turn the turbine off for a total of 23 hours spread over specific dates and times. The average cost per bird was found to be $171.