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Shutterstock. Tuatara.
Tuatara found floating near Takapourewa Stephens Island in the outer Marlborough Sounds will be returned to Ngāti Koata for burial on the islands.
Conservation Department Area Manager Roy Grose says one of the seven dead tuatara found floating near the shore by a Ngāti Koata paua diver was about 100 years old.
A naval patrol spotted three major slips on the island, triggered by heavy rainfall in early February.
A post mortem on the animals indicated they had died from trauma-related injuries consistent with crushing.
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