Otanewainuku Kiwi Trust supporters are eagerly waiting to hear whether the trust will be named winner of the 2014 Mitre 10 Community of the Year Award this week.

Otanewainuku Kiwi Trust chairman Phil Wells and volunteer coordinator Harry Taylor inspect a trap in the reserve. Photo: Tracy Hardy.

The trust, which funds a project to establish a viable kiwi population on the Oropi reserve, was named one of three finalists for the national award earlier this year.

Trust chair Phil Wells is tempered in his hopes for winning, but says the acknowledgement comes with a sense of gathering momentum around the project.

'This is a prestigious national award and it is a great result for our trust,” says Phil.

'It's definitely been a great start to the year.”

The trust is the only regionally-focused group in the finals, competing against the New Zealand Council of Victim Support and KidsCan for the award to be announced on Thursday, February 27.

Since forming in 2003, volunteers have helped transform the forest with an extensive pest control programme to help bird populations recover by targeting stoats, rats and possums that prey on bird eggs.

'The community has rallied as volunteers for the trust, to save the forest and restore the birdlife, including kiwi and the return of the kokako,” says Phil.

Trust members are hoping the resident kiwi population will be boosted this year from young kiwi being raised at a creche near Cambridge, which will be released in about six months. They also hope to translocate adult breeding pairs from Maungataniwha in the Ureweras.

By increasing the base population, it should encourage young birds that are released to stay within the forest rather than wonder off as they have previously done, says Phil.

Attempts to relocate breeding pairs located around Maungataniwha last year were put on hold when kiwi began breeding early.

But supporters' spirits were lifted last April, with the arrival of first kiwi chick from a breeding pair at Otanewainuku in many years.

For more information on the Otanewainuku Kiwi Trust, visit www.kiwitrust.org