Kate Evans
New Zealand
magazine features
Killer algae
New Zealand Geographic (2022)
Caulerpa climbs over rocks and the sandy bottom alike, attaches itself to scallop shells, smothers sponges. It has the potential to transform vast areas of coastline from the tip of Northland to the Bay of Plenty—displacing native species, altering ecosystems that are already under pressure from overfishing and sedimentation, making it harder to gather kaimoana, and draining the mauri from the moana.
Such a dystopian future is unthinkable for mana whenua on Aotea, and they say they’ll do anything to eradicate the invader. But is that possible? What else must be sacrificed, and what might be gained, in the fight to destroy it and prevent its spread? Read more:
What’s the point of all that singing?
New Zealand Geographic (2022)
‘Just So’, a regular column with cartoons by Giselle Clarkson, asks questions about evolution: how we ended up the way we are, and how the animal world has addressed the fundamental questions of life.
What does birdsong mean? Do other animals also sing? Or is song a uniquely human invention?
To human ears, birdsong is poetic, wholesome and romantic—even transcendental. But as far as most birds are concerned, “it’s all sex and violence”, says Kristal Cain, an evolutionary ecologist at the University of Auckland. While some birds woo each other with operatic duets, she says, others use song in posturing rap battles with rivals or to sabotage their mate’s flings with other birds.
From Darwin on, ornithological researchers—the vast majority of whom, in Cain’s words, were “tweed-wearing, whiskered, old white field biologists”—defined birdsong as something male birds did in the breeding season to mark their territory and attract mates. They also assumed that the behaviour common to migratory European and North American birds was standard across the entire avian world. Female birds rarely sang, they declared—and if they did, it was likely the result of “hormonal aberrations”. Read more:
CATCHING RAYS
New Zealand Geographic (2022)
How hard could it be to find a manta ray? They’re six metres wide, after all.
The sky is a glossy midsummer blue as the motorboat rounds Omaha Spit and heads out into the shimmering waters of the Hauraki Gulf. We skim northeast into the slight swell, circling the forested bulk of Te Hauturu-o-Toi/Little Barrier Island, with its plunging valleys and bright cliffs, and a lone cloud thatching its heights. Our destination—the triangle between Hauturu, Aotea/Great Barrier Island and the Mokohinau Islands—is New Zealand’s manta ray hotspot. Read more:
billion dollar fish
New Zealand Geographic (2021)
Tuna are the gold of the ocean—and, because certain species are so sought-after, they’ve become synonymous with overfishing and modern slavery. But in some areas, populations that were teetering on the edge of total wipe-out seem to be making a tentative comeback. Are things finally turning around for these fisheries?
They had started paying out the line the previous afternoon, steaming ahead at full speed while sending mile after mile of three-millimetre-wide monofilament out behind them into the Tasman. Every 11 seconds or so, the crew clipped a snood—a 14-metre-long length of nylon—onto the main line. On the end of the snood dangled an arrow squid the size of a man’s hand, and a 60-gram lead weight.
By the time they were done, it was dark, and the main line stretched for about 30 nautical miles, invisible beneath the surface of the water. In the far distance, the Southern Alps glowed white above the West Coast. Read more:
Republished in Australian Geographic in 2021, and I talked about it on ABC Radio National’s “Counterpoint” show.
The Dark Side of the Moon
North and south (2021)
Is New Zealand lending support to an aggressive American push to commercialise outer space?
In the half-century since people last set foot on Earth’s satellite, humanity has learned some harsh lessons about our impact on the planet we call home. Right now, there is nothing in international law to stop people, countries or corporations from inflicting permanent damage on the moon’s environment. Despite our small size, New Zealand has wound up with a spot in the tiny club of spacefaring nations that will determine the rules for this new frontier. These countries have a limited window of time in which to decide whether the moon will become the exclusive province of swaggering Silicon Valley tech bros, starry-eyed scientists, billionaire space tourists and pragmatic public servants, or whether conservationist or indigenous ways of seeing the world, such as the values of kaitiakitanga, will also play a role. In other words, what kind of human culture will we take with us to the moon? Read more:
REGENERATION
New Zealand Geographic (2021)
Regenerative agriculture is supposed to save us from climate change, freshwater pollution, soil erosion, drought, the invertebrate apocalypse and poor mental health. Does it live up to the hype?
The paddock is a waist-high riot of yellow sunflowers, blue vetch, purple lupins and a dozen shades of green. Small flocks of birds whirr away at our approach, and a pair of honking paradise shelducks fly overhead, black and white against the dusty Dunstan Range. Four-year-old Alfie Rutherford emerges from a waving sea of flowers taller than he is. “Look, Daddy!” He has some sunflower seeds in his hand. “Can we eat them yet?”
Daddy’s Home! The problem of paternity leave (North and South, 2018)
A week and a half after giving birth to our second daughter, I stood in the doorway and watched, baby in arms and toddler wrapped around my leg, as my partner sprinted for the bus to work. Nine hours later, I was counting the minutes until he returned – and, for the first time ever, feeling self-conscious about the state of the house.
Could there be another way? Family policies shape our individual decisions and indicate our nation’s values. So what does the current system say about how we value the role of fathers, and what we view as men’s and women’s work? What benefits might there be in sharing the load – and the pleasures – of childcare more equally?
The current partner’s leave entitlement doesn’t seem to work for almost anyone. The government doesn’t even regularly collect data on it, but the most recent figures they could give me, from a small sample survey in 2006, suggested just 4% of fathers took the two weeks of unpaid partner’s leave. The majority used annual or sick leave in the days after their children’s birth. Read more:
