Paradise LOST

Spin a globe slowly to find New Zealand. It’s one of the world’s most isolated island countries. Australia, the nearest significant land mass, is over a thousand miles away. Composed of two big islands stretching almost 1,000 miles (1,600 km) from north to south, and a galaxy of smaller islands, New Zealand is believed to be a fragment of the ancient southern continent of Gondwanaland.

- Stephen James O'Meara

Over the past 100 million years, as New Zealand inched its way into its present isolation, plant and animal life emerged on the island. As these hardy survivors adapted to their new island home, they evolved into species that are unique to the region. The process is called adaptive radiation. It involves one plant or animal splitting into many species, to fill different ecological niches—ways of life in the same geological area. When this process is well under way, an organism no longer mates with its ancestral type and a new species emerges, with an increased chance for survival.

HOT SPOT

Before humans arrived, New Zealand’s plants and animals lived long and largely without fear. With the lack of predators, flight, for some species of birds, was not necessary for survival. In fact, New Zealand at one time had up to 15 kinds of giant flightless birds called moas. The smallest was the size of a turkey; the largest was a giant at 15 feet (1.5 m) tall. Then, in the thirteenth century, humans arrived on the North Island. In his book The Future of Life, E.O. Wilson describes the moas’ native presence in New Zealand and their subsequent slaughter: