CATS' HUGE TOLL OF BIRDS

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 4, Issue 180, 14 November 1941, Page 4

CATS' HUGE TOLL OF BIRDS

THE number of cats in New Zealand is estimated at a million, many of which have gone wild. Probably some ten million birds are destroyed every year by these animals alone, it is said. A cat belonging to a lighthouse keeper has destroyed an entire species (the endemic Stephens Island flightless wren). Weasels and stoats rob the nests of the flightless wekas —birds which serve as protectors of other native species owing to their destruction of rats. As the weka declines in numbers, so the rats are increasing, and the native birds grow fewer and fewer. Every year many kiwis and wekas fall victims to the traps of opossum hunters. Wild pigs, dogs, and human interference have combined to make kiwis sciarce in all but the remotest areas. What are we as New Zeaianders doing to assist on the preservation of those birds which were native here for thousands of years before the pakehas arrived.

Social Security Payments Chving to November 23 falling on Sunday, age benefits will be obtainable on Thursday, November 20, miscellaneous pensions on Friday 21 and family allowances as usual on Tues-> day 25.

Public Service Entrance Examinations for the Public Service Entrance are to be held at the Whakatane District High School commencing on Tuesday next, November 18 and concluding on Friday, November 21.