Reece

﻿This is my very first time being on my wiki site at school.

1/122010 = __tuis__ ﻿ = Tuis are native birds to New Zealand. Tuis common name and Maori name is Tui and the scientific name is Prosthemadera novaeseelandiae. Tuis are sometimes called the parson bird because the white throat tuffs look like a religious minister’s collar. Tuis have excellent eyesight for searching for food and a long beak for pushing into flowers. Their tongue is long and feathery for taking nectar out of flowers. Tuis have white tuffs under its neck. They have glossy black feathers. The male Tui is 31cm long and the female Tui is 29cm long and the male Tui ways 120g and the female Tui ways 90g. Tuis live in native forests in the tree tops. No one will find them in the open country but we may find them in our gardens. Tuis move from tree to tree to find food. They have a long tail for darting around trees. There powerful wings helps it to fly from plant to plant. Tuis dart through trees at high speed and fold there wings. They sometimes drop nearly to the tree tops like a stone. They are noisy fliers. Tui eat nectar from Kowhai, flax and Pahutakawa plants and also berries from Mahoe, Camprosma, Totara and fuchsia. They love honeydew and sometimes they eat native fruit. Sometimes insect are eaten by Tuis especially when feeding their chicks. They also like the nectar in flowers of the red gum trees (which are not native trees). Tuis sometimes make a lot of different sounds. They make clicks, grunts, rattles, wheezes, cracks and chuckles. Tuis are also mimics {copy cats}. They mainly sing at dawn. Tuis make their nests in the forks of a trees - 3 to 15 m above the ground. They lay 2 to 4 eggs in January and November. The female tui sits on the eggs for 14 days. The chicks leave the nest after 21 days. Tuis often breed twice in a season. They can live up to 12 years old. Tuis will defend there territory by fighting. They also fight over food and sometimes attack people when they get to close. Tuis enemies are wild cats, falcons, harrier hawk and stoats, weasels, rats, possums which eat Tuis eggs and there competitors are like wasps, bellbird, stitch bird. Sometimes the wasps make the tuis go to another place to find food because the wasps have eaten all their food {honey dew}. Tuis are native birds that we should have in our native bush. By Reece

__ Volcanoes __

A volcano is a land form where melted rock called magma erupts through the surface of the earth’s crust. Inside the volcano is an opening vent that leads down to this pool of molten rock. When magma erupts out of the volcano it is called lava. A volcano is on the crust of the earth.

There are many types of volcanoes. The first type is called a composite/cone shaped volcano that has steep sides that are made up of layers of sticky lava and ash. Composite/cone shaped volcanoes look like an upside down ice-cream cone. Another type of volcano is the shield volcano which is fairly flat. It is made of runny lava that can be spread out a fair way. Most volcanoes are found on the edge of a tectonic plate. The Ring of Fire is the name for the many volcanoes found near the edges of the Pacific plate. Eighty or more volcanoes are found under the sea. Shield volcanoes are usually found where two plates are moving apart. This is called a constructive plate boundary and is often under the sea. Composite/cone volcanoes are found where two plates are moving together and one plate is forced back under the earth. This is called a destructive boundary. Some volcanoes don’t even fit the pattern and are found in the middle of the plates where hot rocks come from the middle of the earth. Magma in volcanoes erupts out when two plates are heading towards each other and one gradually gets destroyed. When a plate moves over a hot spot it will form a volcano and erupt. The hot spot stays in the same place as tectonic plates move slowly past. Plates move about one centimetre a year (about how much your toenails grow in a year!) When plates spread apart under the ocean it erupts quietly and the magma is runny. There are 1500 active volcanoes on the earth and 80 or more are under the sea. Volcanoes are land formed with an opening vent that is full of lava.

__Glossary: __ Ash- Very small, fine particles of lava that can be block out sunlight Crust- The earths’ outer layer made up of huge slabs of rock that rest on a bed of liquid rock. Plate- a piece of the earth’s crust that moves. (A bit like a giant jig-saw puzzle pieces

By REECE