#australie aotearoa

[leslie-o-crieff]

Une victoire absolument pas rassurante pour les All Blacks. Certes il y a un peu de malchance mais pas seulement. Il faut montrer un meilleur visage au prochain match.

[all-the-nerdthings]

Behold, the southern lights! Aurora Australis! Glowy sky colors!!

[snototter]

A weka, or Māori Hen (Gallirallus australis) inspects stones in Aotearoa

by Gregory "Slobirdr" Smith

[holliano]

Very faint but still a definite sighting of Aurora Australis!!

11.10.2024

[bethanythebogwitch]

Original New Zealand legendary Pokemon

Another series of fakemon for my Goorda region, based on a combination of Australia and Aotearoa/New Zealand. This entry introduces a minor legendary trio, like the Regis or legendary birds. Links to previous posts at the bottom.

Puwetanga, the Earth Guardian Pokemon, bug/ground type. One of the three legendary Pokemon that protect Goorda's environment. What appears to be a giant insect is actually a construct made of soil, sand, and rock inhabited and animated by a colony of glowing worms. These worms are said in legend to be the very spirits of the land in physical form and they can appear in the stone and soil anywhere in Goorda to act wherever they are needed. Puwetanga is a fickle being that values the environment's safety over human life and will attack industries or settlements that cause too much damage to nature. In the past, when industry polluted the land without regard for nature, Puwetanga was an enemy of humanity. Since then, it is rarely seen, but is always watching and waiting for the time when it will be needed again.

Hinetanga, the Air Guardian Pokemon, bug/fairy type. One of the three legendary Pokemon that protect Goorda's environment. Hinetanga is one with the winds and spends its entire life in the air, continuing to fly even when asleep. Indeed, it has no legs and cold not live on land even if it wanted to. Hinetanga is the most elusive of the trio, very rarely appearing before anyone, but almost everyone in Goorda has seen evidence of its existence. As Hinetanga flies, the holes on its side release luminous gasses that clean the air and produce brilliant curtains of waving light visible at night. It avoids polluted air and will strike out against excess pollution. During the past, when industry polluted the air without care for nature, sightings of Hinetanga became so rare that many feared it had died. Since the dawn of environmentalism, sightings have increased, but it no longer appears every night like it once did.

Tanitanga, the Water Guardian Pokemon, bug/water type. One of the three legendary Pokemon that protect Goorda's environment. Tanitanga can appear in any body of water in Goorda, from the most isolated of pools to the great ocean and it is believed that it watches over the region from every raindrop. Of of its trio, Tanitanga is the most connected with humanity, though it is a fickle being that must be treated with respect. Tribes that respected the environment and left offering for Tanitanga would be protected by it, while those who disrespected the environment could be considered its enemy and attacked with floods and aquatic Pokemon. During the time when industry polluted the waters without concern for nature, Tanitanga lashed out against all peoples and refused to appear to them. Since then, it has once again began appearing to humans, but it still seems wary of us. Those who follow old traditions claim we must restore the environment to regain Tanitanga's trust.

All three of these Pokemon are based on Kaitiakitanga, a Maori concept meaning guardianship of the land, sea, and sky. This can refer to actions and duties people take, but can also refer to the role of some legendary creatures. The latter is what I went with when designing these fakemon. All three are also based on insects and other invertebrates native to Aotearoa/New Zealand.

Puwetanga is based on wētās, large flightless crickets found only in Aotearoa. More specifically, it is based on giant wētās. The glowing worms that control the wētā body are based on Arachnocampa luminosa, the New Zealand glowworms. These are cave-dewlling insect larvae that bioluminesce and dangle sticky, beaded strings that are used to attract and ensnare bugs for the worm to eat. The bead-like decorations on Puwetanga are based on the glowworm strings. Its name comes from "pūrātoke" (one of the Maori names for the glowworms), "wētā", and "Kaitiakitanga".

Hinetanga is based on moths. More specifically its wing shape and body are based on the hawk moth Agrius convolvuli while the green wing markings are based on Cosmodes elegans. The luminous gasses that Hinetanga releases are based on the southern lights. Aotearoa is one of the best places in the world to see the southern lights so I wanted to represent them with a Pokemon. Hinetanga's name comes from "Ngā Kurakura o Hinenuitepō", which is one of two Maori names I found for the southern lights.

Tanitanga is based on the Taniwha, a legendary guardian of the water in Maori legend. Depending on the tradition, the Taniwha can either be a protective guardian being or a dangerous predator that attacks people. I worked both into my fakemon. The Taniwha is usually depicted as a shark or lizard, but since this is a bug trio, I went a different way and based it on a mayfly larva. Mayfly larvae are aquatic and breathe through gills on their side. I also gave Tanitanga a crayfish's claws. Crayfish are also native to Aotearoa, but since Goorda is based on Australia too, the claws can also work as a reference to the absolutely massive crayfish that live in Tasmania.

Previous fakemon posts: New Zealand misc, new evolutions, misc 4, misc 3, single stages, non-natives, regional standards, creepy lines, regional variants, birds, early game standards, misc 2, misc 1, Johto starter variants, starters.

[blackbird-brewster]

Aurora Australis - 11 May 2024

Puketotara, Aotearoa

(Photos taken by a friend of mine)

[blackberryjambaby]

did any of my kiwi ( or aus!!) mutuals see the aurora australis this week?? it was way too cloudly here :(

[cheekybrassmonkey]

Hell yeah it happened again! Taken by me, out my laundry door at 4am while I was flinging cat shit into the wilderness cos living rural rocks

[incognitopolls]

Anon lives in aotearoa new zealand and was pleasantly surprised to find out they could see the aurora too!! it was very pretty and they're glad they got to see it. Feel free to put your country in the comments but no pressure 👍

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[sapphia]

Aurora Australis/The Southern Lights — Tai Tapu, Te Waipounamu, Aotearoa New Zealand

[ierotits]

woagh.......aurora australis.....from the middle of a city in aotearoa.....

[leslie-o-crieff]

Bon, même si l'Aotearoa est pas au meilleur de sa forme, s'ils gagnent pas contre l'Australie là y a un énorme problème parce que l'Australie eux ils sont au bord du gouffre.

[drhoz]

#2581 - Apteryx mantelli - North Island Brown Kiwi

One of Aotearoa's iconic flightless birds - in fact the human inhabitants of the island are frequently referred to as Kiwis. 'Apteryx' means 'without wings'. Generally the case with the humans, too.

The picture above is the photo the Hokitika Kiwi Centre gives you if you go in to see their resident birds - Kiwi are nocturnal and do NOT react well to flash photography, or bright light in general. The US zoo that was running Kiwi encounters in daylight caused an international incident when New Zealand found out. You probably could have heard the collective howl of outrage from across the Pacific.

Apteryx mantelli is part of the Brown Kiwi species complex - three species that were all considered Apteryx australis until genetic evidence proved otherwise. There's two other Kiwi species as well.

Females stand about 40 cm (16 in) in height and weigh a little over two and a half kilos.

Not, in fact, closely related to Aotearoa's enormous but equally flightless Moa - their closest known relatives are Madagascar's extinct Elephant Birds, and fossils from the St Bathams Fauna suggest the Kiwi's ancestors flew there well after the moa were already flightless. Their closest living relatives are the emu and cassowary of Australia.

Once they arrived, they promptly occupied one of the ecological niches that eslewhere are occupied by mammals. Kiwi are omnivores, and use their long beaks to probe for worms and other invertebrates in the leaf litter and soil. They have an extraordinarily good sense of smell for a bird. They've also been seen fishing for crayfish.

Kiwi as extremely vunerable to dog attack, which is just one reason all the species are considered Vulnerable to Critically Endangered. Stoats are another serious threat to younger birds, which is why eggs are taken from nests and reared in captivity until they're big enough to kick a stoat to death. Quite territorial - the captive birds patrolled the edges of their pens very intensely when the other bird was visible.

During the day, and when nesting, they live in burrows. They're also infamous for the size of their eggs, up to a quarter of the size of the hen. Unsurprisingly, after laying up to seven of those in a season, the hens want nothing to do with actually incubating the eggs. Chicks are precocious, entirely capable of walking and foraging within days of hatching.

Hokitika, Aotearoa New Zealand.

[notahorseindisguise]

australia is a pretty good name for australia. like i think its good. originally australia was called new holland. 👎👎👎 bad name too colonise-y.

and while it would be cool if we could do what aotearoa is trying to do and use an indigenous word for the land. australia did have over 250 distinct languages and over 800 different dialects. we'll never be able to get a good word that accurately reflects our indigenous history.

meanwhile, the name australia comes from the word australis, a latin word meaning southern, because before the brits "found" australia (it wasnt lost) they had been searching for terra australis, a southern land, for a long while. and australia being a name just essentially meaning southern. i think reflects all australians pretty decently. we're not up there. we're down here. and happy about it. yk? so theres a random history/etymology lesson for u ig

[tinydefector]

Silly little thing that I thought I'd laugh about today because at work I was listening to stuff over the mystery of Atlantis and they trying to figure out if it could have been a place in Europe, Asia, Africa and showing all of these things which date back to Plato and the whole time I'm sitting there going. "Has no one ever considered Australia and the many tiny island countries.

So before I continue, I would like to respect and honour the elders of the past, present, and future of each land. And pay custodians to the people of each country.

I know they were talking about an island that was the size of a continent which just vanished but when you look up some of the stuff about Australia. Such as what it looked like during the ice ages before the great melt.

And I see so many people trying to talk about different countries and esteeming artifscts and items trying to get the timeline close to when oral histories talked about Atlantis. And them dating items that from this day would only be maybe 10-15 thousand years old. When Australia has indigenous artifacts which date back

Which for that time could be considered advanced technology.

Not to mention We have our own stories of "great flood" which have been passed down throught oral traditions so vary depending on mob and location. But following that

"Australis" and then we have "Aotearoa" (New Zealand) but it isn't far of from Atlantis. It was just a silly little thing that honestly doubt there is really much to it but it was something I wanted to share with the internet because I haven't really seen much on the fact of Australia ever really being considered for possible being Atlantis. But yea silly little thought from work today and thought I'd share it. Not really the stuff I post here but hey if it gets people interested in doing some deep digging why not, it's a fun thing to think about.