Wild Sounds: Kākāpō Files II

New Zealand once led the world in marine protection. Now it looks like we will fail to meet our international promise to protect 30 percent of our ocean estate by 2030. Why is stopping fishing so politically fraught? How might our ideas about marine protection need to change? And why, when our seas are in need, is it taking us so long to learn to talk to each other? This episode was first released...

The Bounty Islands are tiny in terms of area - just some bits of granite jutting out of the ocean. But they are huge in terms of seabirds. James Frankham joins a team researching the erect-crested penguins who breed in this remote archipelago. Recent counts suggest the penguins of the Bounties are doing fine. But this is not the case on the Antipodes Islands, and the researchers desperately want t...

What roles do our ocean ecosystems play in capturing carbon? Kate Evans speaks to iwi Māori working to improve the health of an estuary in the Bay of Plenty, and to scientists studying the fiords of New Zealand's southwest coast. There's potential for huge amounts of carbon to be locked away, if we don't mess it up.  This episode was first released on 21 March 2024. To avert the worst of the clima...

People and livestock gobble so much fish that the seas soon won't keep up. Is the answer to grow fish on land? Kate Evans meets scientists figuring out the puzzles of how to farm some of New Zealand's iconic ocean creatures. This episode was first released on 14 March 2024. Many of our fisheries are under pressure. At the same time people are eating more fish. Could farming iconic New Zealand spec...

Kina numbers are exploding on some of our reefs, decimating seaweed habitats. Could this problem be solved by eating them? Kate Evans investigates the potential of kina-nomics. This episode was first released on 7 March 2024. The kina are out of control. As many as 40 urchins crowd into a single square metre of rock, devoid of other life. A kina barren is a symptom of an ecosystem out of balance....

Crackle, pop, woof, crunch, click. In the ocean, an undersea orchestra is in full swing. Journalist Kate Evans discovers who's playing in it and why, and what happens when human noise drowns out this symphony in the sea. This episode was first released on 29 February 2024. Symphony in the sea Journalist Kate Evans and presenter Claire Concannon discover a world of snapping shrimp, singing whales a...

A collaboration between Our Changing World and New Zealand Geographic, the Voice of Tangaroa series explores the state of our oceans, and the extraordinary variety of life that calls it home.  This series was first released in 2024. 93% of New Zealand is covered in salt water. 80% of our biodiversity is in our seas. And yet this is the part of our realm we understand the least and treat the worst....

Claire Concannon spoke to RNZ's climate correspondent Eloise Gibson for the last episode of the Voice of the Sea Ice series. Listen to the full interview between Eloise and Claire in which they talk about the Paris Agreement, New Zealand's international climate commitments, and what we can do as individuals. Sign up to the Our Changing World monthly newsletter for episode backstories, science anal...

Human-induced climate change is impacting Earth’s global systems, including ice melt in Antarctica. What is the world doing to combat it? Signed in 2016, the Paris Agreement is the current global plan to tackle it. Countries pledge different emission reduction targets and then produce their workings and homework about how they are going about it. Where does New Zealand fit in? Are we doing our bit...

In February 2025, the world hit a new low for global sea ice extent. Arctic sea ice has been declining for several decades now, but Antarctic sea ice had been holding steady, until recently. With low summer sea ice extents for four years in a row, it appears that Earth’s warming has kicked Antarctic sea ice into a new regime. Claire Concannon speaks to scientists to understand what this means for...

Penguins that return to the ice in the middle of winter to lay their eggs. Seals that use cracks in the ice to keep their pups safe. And fish that have antifreeze proteins to survive in the icy cold waters... Antarctic life is tough, and full of surprises. Scientists are keen to piece together the Antarctic food web puzzle to better understand the interconnections, and to enable smart conservation...

What’s it like to live and work on the frozen ocean? A team of researchers are camping out on the sea ice to investigate the small critters that live on the bottom of the ice, and among the sloshy platelet ice layer just below it. From microalgae to krill, these tiny organisms hold up the big complex food web of Antarctica. Scientists are keen to understand these communities, and how they might sh...

Step out on the sea ice just outside New Zealand’s Scott Base with researchers studying the physics of its annual cycle. Each year a massive patch of ocean around Antarctica freezes and then melts again come summer – Antarctica’s heartbeat. In winter, the ice effectively more than doubles the size of this already massive continent, and it plays a huge role in controlling our planet’s climate. Gues...

Welcome to Antarctica - a land of ice, extremes, and ambition. From historic expeditions to modern day science projects, Antarctic exploration is a unique, and dangerous, experience. We meet one researcher involved in an epic journey across the largest ice shelf in Antarctica, mapping a safe route through a crevassed landscape for others to follow. Plus, we learn about the different types of ice f...

Each winter the sea ice that forms around Antarctica effectively doubles the size of this massive continent. It’s one of the biggest annual global changes. It reflects sunlight, drives ocean currents and is home to a host of critters key to the Antarctic food web. But the last few years have seen unusually low sea ice extents in Antarctica, and scientists are sounding the alarm. Is this a blip, or...