Warrington School pupil Mira Neuman prepares to track sea lions at Sandfly beach on the Otago Peninsula using a VHF tracker. Photo by Peter McIntosh.
The Warrington School pupil won a competition to become a ranger for a day with her short story about plastic bag pollution and how it affected a pod of dolphins.
Mira chose to be a coastal ranger from a list of options, including skink ranger, freshwater fish ranger and threatened plant ranger.
"It is fun to learn about seals and I like penguins a lot."
Mira tracked sea lions using a VHF tracker at beaches around the Otago Peninsula and joined Doc workers conducting a survey of penguin nests at Boulder beach.
Coastal ranger Jim Fyfe said a PhD student was keeping track of female sea lions for one year to get an idea of the habitat they used.
The competition was run last month during Conservation Week.
