Three years ago a fossil was found at st Bathams in New Zealand. The record books now have to be rewritten. It seems the fossil is an ancestor of the Kiwi and it indicates that it was related to the Australian emu. This undermines the premise that the kiwi is a solely New Zealand bird. After all it is the national symbol.
You see, the emu relative could fly and it flew to New Zealand. It was a tiny bird compared to the kiwi. The enormous egg that kiwis lay evolved. It was not "handed-down" by the giant Moa. Eggs began to get larger in birds during the Miocene.
The theory that the kiwi originated in Australia was commonly held before this fossil find. It was believed to have got to New Zealand when the country was joined to Australia on Gondwanaland, but his view has been put to rest.
Most New Zealand birds got bigger over time. This was not unusual. The kiwi evolved from the earlier tiny ancestor. Discovery of this 20 million year old fossil was pure luck. It is the oldest fossil ever found in New Zealand.
Conservation by Ty Buchanan
