Dr Karen Colgan, of Auckland, MNZM for services to wildlife conservation and education
Dr Karen Colgan was a founding member of the Ark in the Park conservation movement, re-introducing native birds to a 2,500-hectare area of the Waitakere Ranges. She was Volunteer Coordinator and served on the Ark Management Committee. She was instrumental in the success of the programme, which reached 25,000 volunteer hours annually. She helped set up predator control and has been involved in re-establishing the penguin and petrel population at O’Neill Bay and Te Henga Beach in West Auckland. She is a founding Trustee of Opanuku Birdsong Trust. Dr Colgan has worked with three West Auckland primary schools with Catch-IT-Schools, a hands-on science and data analysis predator control education programme.