Diet
Kerer? are very important to New Zealand forests because they are the only birds capable of swallowing the largest fruits of native trees such as taraire and karaka. They eat the fruit, leaves, twigs, buds, and shoots of a hundred native and over fifty exotic shrubs and trees. Occasionally, gorging on very ripe fruit can make kererü drunk and they have been known to fall out of trees.
They eat the fruit from one kind of tree, such as miro, then fly to other trees, such as kauri, to digest their meal - eventually leaving behind a dropping containing a seed and its very own package of fertiliser. This helps trees to spread into new areas - known as colonising new habitats. Kerer? are a key contributor to maintaining forest complexity and are a ‘keystone species' of the lowland forests.
