Hunting the Roo

Horowhenua Chronicle, 28 October 1913, Page 4

Hunting the Roo

The kangaroo herd at the Melbourne Zoological Gardens has received a very acceptable addition as a result of a '"drive" held recently in lliverina (says the Melbourne Age). ALoonbriii station (near Denilquiu) -forming , part of the estate of l r . S. lAilkiner and Sons is a sort of sanctuary for birds and animals, varieties which elsewhere are becoming extinct being , there found in abundance. The hunting- party included .Mr Le Souef, director of the Melbourne Zoological Gardens. A wire-netting yard had been constructed on the Yanko boundary fence, with a wing about half *a mile in length, for yarding' purposes. Horsemen were stationed at intervals along 1 each side of (he paddock, and members of the i party, in four motor ears, adran- I ('■ed from the back fence. . About r>oo kangaroos were sighted, but most of them broke away,_ and ('(torts made to prevent their escape were futile. The speed was about thirty miles an hour, and the run wsis successfully made by the motorists. Caution whs necssary to avoid collisions with stumps hidden in the long , grass, or where soft ground had to be traversed. One light ear was

driven into a swamp, and was bogged. Several of the kangaroos, which the party succeeded in driving between the fence and the wing died from over-exertion or heart failure. They were very fat, and quite out of racing condition. Others killed themselves by jumping into the wire fence. Eou+teeu kangaroos were captured alive and were, trucked to the Zoological Gardens. The animals are of the .red variety, ami one of them, an "old man"—evidently of patriarchal age is of huge size, and is the largest kangaroo ever seen h.v Mr Wilkie, the overseer of the Gardens, ij\ all his long experience. The man' stands about seven feet high, has an enormous tail and wonderfully muscular shoulders. It is Mi Wilkie , s opinion that in a standing encounter with him no human being, young or old, would have [ any chance of victory.