A few weeks ago, I went to check out the local bird sanctuary where we were staying in Te Anna, New Zealand.

On that quiet evening, I unexpectedly experienced a remarkable encounter with a “bird of dreams.”

That morning our bed and breakfast hostess in the Otago Peninsula, Cathy, spoke of a time when giant flightless moa birds, 12 feet high, walked the land.

Birds ruled – there were no land mammals until the Maori came along in the 1300s and hunted the moas to extinction.

Cathy didn’t happen to mention that a smaller flightless bird – reminiscent of the moa – still tramps the earth… and there it was before me in a large enclosure at the sanctuary, the takahe!

These striking birds, with feather colours ranging from black to green to blue, and a large red prehistoric looking bill stand

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