Nic’s New Zealand Nature: Wild Buddies… and Baddies

Have you heard the phrase ‘you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours’? New Zealand’s plants, animals, fungi and other tiny organisms grew to live in, on and around each other, with very little interference from the rest of the world, since separating from Gondwana over 80 million years ago. This has created many unusual relationships in the wild – some friendly and some not so friendly!

Nic’s New Zealand Nature: Wild Buddies has highly readable text, fascinating facts and superb photographs by Rod Morris. Nicola Vallance explores the co-existence of New Zealand wildlife through one-sided friendships, pesky parasites and win-win relationships.

From tuataras snuggling up to seabirds and rātā trees that like to piggyback rimu trees. To worms that can take over the minds of wētās! When one part of an ecosystem disappears or fails, it can have cascading effects throughout the chain and even affect us. In Wild Buddies and Baddies, readers will discover how everything is connected, how relationships in the wild really work and our role in the environment – are humans ‘baddies’, ‘buddies’, or both?

Author Biography
Nicola Vallance is the National Media Manager for the Department of Conservation. She is also the writer/presenter of Meet the Locals, a TVNZ6 series of more than 150 four-minute shorts featuring native New Zealand wildlife. She is also a regular guest on Good Morning. This is her first book. Rod Morris is one of New Zealand’s most talented wildlife photographers and filmmakers.