Kapiti Island ([kɑːpiti]), sometimes written as Kāpiti Island, is an island nature reserve located 5.6 km (3 mi) off the west coast of the lower North Island of New Zealand and within the Kāpiti Coast District. Parts of the island were previously farmed, but it is now a predator-free sanctuary for endemic birds, including many endangered birds. The island is 10 km (6.2 mi) long, running southwest/northeast, and roughly 2 km (1.2 mi) wide, being more or less rectangular in shape, and has an area of 19.65 km2 (7.59 sq mi). The island is separated from the North Island by the Rauoterangi Channel. The highest point on the island is Tūteremoana, 521 m (1,709 ft). The seaward (west) side of the island is particularly rocky and has high cliffs, some hundreds of metres high, that drop straight into the sea. The cliffs are subject to very strong prevailing westerly winds and the scrubby vegetation that grows there is low and stunted by the harsh environmental conditions. A cross-section of the island would show almost a right-angled triangle, revealing its origins from lying on a fault line (part of the same ridge as the Tararua Range). The island's vegetation is dominated by scrub and forest of kohekohe, tawa, and kanuka. Most of the forest is regenerating after years of burn-offs and farming, but some areas of original bush remain, with 30 m (98 ft) trees.
Name and etymology The full original name for the island is Te Waewae-Kapiti-o-Tara-rāua-ko-Rangitāne, meaning "the boundary of Tara and Rangitāne" and referring to it as a place where the rohe (territories) of Ngāi Tara (now known as Muaūpoko) and Rangitāne (descendents of Whātonga) iwi adjoined each other. The word kapiti (meaning 'to be joined') is spelt without a macron, and is unrelated to the word kāpiti (cabbage). The island does not have an official name, but is recorded on topographical maps and hence in the New Zealand Gazetteer as Kapiti Island. In 2010 the Māori Language Commission acknowledged that, while the ordinary word kapiti does not have a macron, iwi of the Kāpiti region have evidence from history and local pronunciation that the place name is a variant form of āpiti, and that Kāpiti (with a macron) is correct. In the past, it was sometimes spelt Capiti Island. The island also became known by Māori as Motu Rongonui, or the "famous island". When James Cook visited New Zealand during his 1770 survey, he called it Entry Island or Entry Isle, but Cook's name did not come into common use.
History The Kāpiti Coast region has been occupied by Māori since the 12th century. Around the year 1150, Māori navigator Whātonga of the waka Kurahaupō divided the country into two sections: land from the southern tip of Kapiti Island north was given to his son Tautoki and his ancestors, who became Rangitāne iwi, and from the southern tip south was given to his son Tara and ancestors (Ngāi Tara, now known as Muaūpoko). The traditional name for the island refers to this division between Ngāi Tara and Rangitāne. The island was surveyed in 1770 during the first voyage of James Cook. In the early 1800s, the island was in the rohe of Muaūpoko. Te Rauparaha of Ngāti Toa saw the advantage of settling on Kapiti Island, after noticing how Western ships frequented the Cook Strait area, who would be good trading partners. In 1821, amid pressure from tribes in the Waikato, Te Rauparaha led a migration of Ngāti Toa from Kawhia Harbour to the Cook Strait, and went on to settle on the Kapiti Coast and Waikanae in 1822, securing it and the island from Muaūpoko in 1823. The tribe regularly sailed in canoes on raiding journeys up to the Whanganui River and down to Marlborough. In response to these actions, several local iwi combined forces and attempted to drive Ngāti Toa from the area. This culminated in the 1824 Battle of Waiorua, in which Ngāti Toa destroyed a combined fleet from local iwi who had landed at the northern end of Kapiti in an attempt to capture the island. Te Rauparaha encouraged European ships to visit Kapiti, which by 1830 became a centre for the New Zealand flax trade. By 1850, no members of Ngāti Toa permanently lived on the island, but occasionally visited for the island's resources.
Ownership Ownership of the island, and nearby Mana Island, reverted to Ngāti Toa on 31 December 2024 under a Treaty of Waitangi settlement.
Whaling
In the 1830s and 1840s, the island became one of the most developed areas in the country for whaling, due to the South Taranaki Bight and Cook Strait being whale nurseries. During whaling times 2,000 people were based on the island. There were seven whaling stations in and around Kapiti Island. Oil was melted from the blubber and shipped to America for use in machinery before petroleum was used. Five whaling stations were established on Kapiti, with three additional stations on the offshore islets of Tokomāpuna Island / Aeroplane Island, Motungārara Island / Fishermans Island and Tahoramaurea Island / Browns Island to the south-east. The whaling station on Waiorua Bay was surrounded by a "rough township". After the collapse of the whaling industry in the 1840s, whalers and their families left the island.
Deforestation and farming
The island was originally forested with rātā, kahikatea and rimu. Between 1825 and 1840 part of the island's vegetation was burned to allow for farming. Between 1874 and the 1890s, the Māori Land Court partitioned the island into blocks, primarily owned by Western Maori MP Wiremu Parata and his family members. In the 1890s, the Wellington Acclimatisation Society requested that Alfred Ross, a leaseholder and sheep farmer on the island, turn his farm into a game reserve, releasing quail, pheasants and later brushtail possums onto the island. By the 1900s, most of the island had been acquired by the New Zealand government for the reserve, except for a section in the north. As the land at the north end could no longer be leased to European farmers, it was farmed directly by Ngāti Toa as a sheep farm by the Webber family. The Webber family continued to farm on the island until the 1950s, most land being sold in 1967, however Ngāti Toa retain some land and rights of access to the island.
Wildlife reserve
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