User:Kotare

"Kotare"?
This is the Māori name for the Sacred Kingfisher, a beautiful bird with a lot of character.

General
I have been on wikipedia for almost 5 years now and in that time I have left high school, been to university for a couple of years, worked full time and travelled twice in South America on 2 trips for a total of more than 6 months. Right now (mid 2010) I am working and I will return to Victoria University of Wellington in march 2011 to finish off my BSc.

My main interest in life is Nature and its Conservation (particularly forest conservation), Tramping (hiking), reading and cross country running. Basically I'm a rabid conservationist - there is so much beauty in nature and so much that it can teach us and it pains me to think that future generations may have to live in a world made drearier by the destruction of so much of it. It's depressing enough living in a New Zealand where 51% of our native land bird species are now extinct.

"As we extinguish a large portion of our planet's biological diversity, we will also lose a large portion of our world's beauty, complexity, intellectual interest, spiritual depth and ecological health.. [The] future we're presently headed towards is a future of soul-withering biological loneliness" - David Quammen, "Song of the Dodo"

Because the challenges faced by the modern day conservation movement are so massive, it is easy to lose hope but it's important to be positive;

"We may not save all we should like to but we shall save a great deal more than if we had never tried" - Sir Peter Scott, Co founder of WWF.

Discussion:
I was the first wikipedian to write a section on the "place in Maori culture" of a New Zealand bird in an article on a species of one, which I did for the Kakapo article back in 2007. This has since set a precedent and there is now much potential to develop similar sections for other NZ bird species. I also did similar sections for Huia and Whitehead (bird). I am a very sporadic contributor and unfortunately (because I like the sound of "wiki-elf" much more) I am undoubtably a wikiorge. I have made over 2000 edits to date but most of these were in 2007 with a little in 2008 and virtually nothing in 2009. In mid 2010 I started to get back into it, with the goal of improving the quality of a number of existing articles on New Zealand animals and ultimately pushing some to FA; my efforts bore fruit and together with some other dedicated WP:Bird members and FAC altruists, I got Huia to FA in September 2010. There used to be only 1 NZ animal article at FA level; Kakapo (out of a total of 15 FAs for articles on NZ topics); Huia makes 2 - but there is still much work to be done! It would be nice to get that figure up to 5 within the next year or so.

Articles/Stubs I have created; 33 (a)
Ngati hotu, Jatun Sacha Foundation, Makaro/Ward Island, Mahoe, Global volunteer network, Kawekaweau, New Zealand Geckos, Earina mucronata, Earina autumnalis, Whitehead (bird) (work in progress), Wrybill, Lake Kohangatera, Lake Kohangapiripiri, Nothofagus truncata, Shore Plover, Drosera stenopetala, Drosera arcturi, Drosera pygmaea, Drosera filiformis,Utricularia australis, Utricularia delicatula, Utricularia dichotoma, Utricularia geminiscapa, Utricularia gibba, New Zealand Striped Skink, Aorangi Range, Mohoua, Chongon Colonche Range, New Zealand Batfly, Sinbad skink, Barrier skink

Articles I have contributed quite a bit to; 4 (b)
Tieke, Ecologyfund.com,Naultinus,

Articles I have contributed a little bit to; 5 (c)
Kakapo ,Common duiker, Campbell Island Teal, The Beach (novel), Hoplodactylus

Articles to which I have contributed photos of my own; 2 (d)
Winika, HMNZS Rotoiti

My Favourite articles to which I have contributed - all mentioned above - (read; I think these kiwi animals are pretty awesome)
Huia (b),Kakapo (c), Whitehead (bird) (a,b),Naultinus (b),Sinbad skink (a),