'Welcome home': Godwit touches in New Zealand after being blown away to Alaska

A migrating godwit that had blown away to Alaska has returned to New Zealand.

Known as 4BWRB, the unlucky male bird, had to fly 33 hours non-stop to reach the country.

Strong winds had ruined its efforts of touch down in New Zealand on time despite having flown over 2,000 km.

''Now it’s back here, it’s got time to recover, it’s got time to do the feather moult and time to get all the preparations on track,'' said Keith Woodley, the manager of the Pūkorokoro Miranda Shorebird Centre.

Bar-tailed godwits are one of 35 species that come to New Zealand every summer from their breeding ground in the Arctic.

They all move huge distances as the seasons change to either exploit rich feeding grounds or to avoid frozen lands.

Habitat destruction along routes taken by the world’s migratory birds poses an increasing peril to these long-distance fliers, with a vast majority crossing terrain that nations are inadequately protecting, according to scientists.

The bar-tailed godwit is a bird that migrates from Arctic breeding grounds to Australia and New Zealand. Along the way, the birds stop to rest and feed at Yellow Sea mudflats in China, North Korea, and South Korea.

Declines in bar-tailed godwits and other shorebird species is due to habitat changes in the Yellow Sea. This is where they stop over on their migrations to and from the Arctic breeding grounds to refuel and gather food.

Known as kuaka, godwits are revered in Maori culture.

Folklore has it that following their annual flight path led early Polynesian voyagers to discover Aoteraoa, “the land of the long white cloud” more than 750 years before European explorers stumbled across the isolated islands in the 18th century.

Even today, the birds’ epic journey gives them a kind of ''mana,''a Maori word meaning a dignity worthy of respect.