AUCKLAND MUSEUM.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1492, 15 July 1912, Page 2

AUCKLAND MUSEUM.

e INTERESTING AND CURIOUS ADDITIONS. (By TclegrapU-Spcclal Correspondent.) Auckland, July 11. . At tho Auckland Museum quite a number of interesting additions have been [laced on exhibition during the last few weeks. Prominent among these is a series of fish collected by Mr. Griffin (taxidermist) during a recent trip on the nineinoa round the North Cape, and olso from other, sources. As tho specimens have been painted in their natural colours by Mr. Griffin. Hie collection makes a very attractive display. One species, which is known as the. blue fish, is remarkable for its bright ultramarino colour, over which golden spots aro soatfered. It is really ono of the most beautiful of the Now Zealand fishes, and is also oho of the rarest. Another prettily-col-oured specimen.is a variety of scorpis (originally discovered by Captain , Fairchild on the New Zealand coast), and is coloured a pinkish purple, with a white under eurfaoe. . There is also a specimen of tho red cod, a fish .not often seen in Auckland waters, , although common in the south. A. peculiar .variety of trevalli has been secured, together with a singularly coloured parrot fish. A beautiful specimen of the bird of paradise. : which has already been mentioned as having been presented by Mt. Pickering, of Port Moresby, British New Guinea, has now been mounted and plaoed on exhibition, nnd from , its great beauty and its bright metallic colours is sure to attract a great deal of attention.

■ Sotno. interesting Maori articles have been added to the collection, including an unusually largo hoeroa, a curjoiis weapon made from the rib of the whale, which has been presented by Mr. G. M. Clark, of Waimate, Bay of Islands. Mr. George Graham, who has repeatedly .mode additions to tho Maori collection, has now forwarded a paddle with ;\ singularly concave surface, a very unusual type. He has also, presented a mere made by the Knipara Natives many years ago. from drift wood from the wreck of H.M.S. Orpheus, together with several net floats nnd fish hooks, the latter with kiwi fea. thers attached. A curious little ninuhi, or fish trap, which was dug up at n. depth of several feet in a peat swamp has br-en given by Mr. A. Bresmau, of Lower Waikato. Finally Mr. P. Bridges, who is at present in Auckland, has presented an unusually large and perfect leg bone of a moa, which is considerably over 3ft. in length.

When the fact was published that a ser-pent-like fish had been found at llouhora, Mr. T. Cheescnwm, curator of tho museum, thinking that it might perchance prove to bo what is known as a ribbon fish, wrote up for particulars: Tho reply was to the effect that the most characteristic feature of tho fish at the present time was its smell, which proved to bo quite true and -was still more emphasised by the time it reached Auckland. Mr. Cheese-nian soon identified the remains as those of a thresher shark, which is remarkable for the great length of its tail. It is by no means an uncommon fish in both the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. There is a common impression that the thresher shark goes about-in shoals and attacks whale?. Mr. Cheeseman, however, states that tho threshers live on other fish which they round up by swimming in ever narrowing circles and.'threshing" tho \ratcr with their long tails until the frightened quarry is at last herded close together when tho attackers innko. a rush into the centre and secure their meal.