Trust founders Tamsin Orr-Walker and Lorne Roberts visited Queenstown recently.
The Kea Conservation Trust was set up in 2006 and is dedicated to the conservation of kea in New Zealand.
Ms Orr-Walker, a former native species keeper at Auckland Zoo, said anyone could take part in the winter survey every weekend in July.
"This is the third year of the annual winter survey and we are keen to make this event even more successful this year, with more people out there counting kea.
Our online recording form means that everyone can easily complete and send kea sightings into us in less than five minutes," she said.
Information gathered from the community-based survey and intensive summer surveys would provide crucial data on kea numbers, breeding success, movement between areas and survival between seasons.
Observers should aim to take note of the birds' numbers, coloured bands, presence of yellow feathers and general behaviour.
She said little was known about the status and numbers of kea in the South Island.
"These beautiful, intelligent, charismatic alpine parrots are a tourist icon in New Zealand's South Island, but sadly are disappearing."
There were only between 1000 and 5000 birds in New Zealand situated west of the main divide from Nelson to Fiordland and around Kaikoura.
"There are a lot of unknowns - we don't have a clear indication of population or whether they are stable.
There's a great difficulty in monitoring because of the cost and the terrain," she said.
The birds had been fully protected since 1986 but had recently been reclassified from nationally endangered to naturally uncommon, she said.
She was worried about the reclassification given the unknowns, because kea would remain a low conservation priority.
"We have anecdotal reports of decline but we don't know why.
There are many issues: possums, 1080, human conflict, lead poisoning and road kill.
We don't know which one is doing the damage but alarm bells are ringing and we want to find ways of mitigating the issues," she said.
A study of 50 birds at Mount Cook showed 100% had lead in their blood, 26 had high levels and nine died from lead poisoning, she said.
Kea would always check out anything new in their surroundings.
"That's what allows them to survive in extreme conditions but swallowing toxic substances is a problem especially for juveniles," she said.
People should not feed kea because it made the young reliant on handouts and attracted them to roadways where they could end up as road-kill - and chocolate or cooked onions could kill them.
"There are other ways to interact with them. Kea think people are fascinating and will come and check you out without being fed," she said.
The trust was working with the Department of Conservation on testing 1080 pellets containing kea repellant.
Take part in the survey at: www.keaconservation.co.nz
