THE LAND BIRDS OF WEST LAND.

Hokitika Guardian, 16 November 1921, Page 4

THE LAND BIRDS OF WEST LAND.

(Written by the late Mr Charles Douglas, the well-known explorer of the mountains of Westland.)

(Continued.) THE BLUE HEAD. This mysterious bird 1 cull say little about, as I only once saw one and that was thirty years ago. Ii my memory is correct the bird resembled a tom tit, but the peculiarity about it was its beak and legs were a bright ultramarine. There is a grass growing in the hush with a bright blue berry which the natives use as a dye, and 1 have inv suspicion that blue, head was only a tom tit that had decorated himseli. WHEN'S.

There ore three varieties of this tailloss bird, somewhat alike in appearmice, but differing in size from that of a tomtit to one very little larger than a humming bird. They arc all as a rule mountain birds —true troglodites hut sometimes they visit the low country. hut it is seldom tohv come to the low country nowadays. Their place of safety is in the high hack ranges among tlic rocks at the grass line. The largest wren is a funny bird to watch hopping about a cam)). He is continually on the move, wings and legs going all the time. If be ever sleeps except hopping, 1 don’t know. ne\et having seen one quiet except on its nest. Like so many othei small birds, they are eillmr getting destroyed, even in the ranges, or are leaving the country. Wild" cats must kill great numbers of them, and cats arc to he found oven up close to the snow line.

THE YELLOW EYE. This bird .1 think, ought to have gone in with the grass birds as it frequents river flats and clearings. Whether it is a native bird as it is said to he, or whether it is an importation from 1 ►crimps the North Island, 1 can’t say. hut I have no recollection of having ever seen one in Westland till some twenty year.' ago. Now they swarm everywhere in Hocks like sparrows. That is all I know about them. Where limy came from and it is said they came all at mice. 1 leave to others to decide. MYSTERIOUS 111IIOS.

Often ivt night, whether in the hash or among the mountains, strange unknown noises are heard in the air. On the Slmtover river we used to listen to a Miund high up in the 1 air as of a Hoi k • f huge birds travelling at great speed. What they were no one knew. Some imagined they weie angel-. \. bethel black or white was open to aiglimeot. Others thought they might he wild

r<ese or swans Hying to the Aotaretie instead of the Artie Ocean, as i- their habit in tin’ Northern Hcmispheie, hut mi oni' was any the wi-er. In ttesthunl the same sound ran otti’ll he lieaid at night and at eirlaia seasons. One night when ramped .ihmit live I!aaisjiini leet oil the Oividr. I sildih'tl’v heard the same rush of wing- and ..' all-Hill low down. So I made a Hare

with the lire. Kiny-znnque came from hove; the mystery was solved. The angels weie unpuetienl paradise ducks ;L ing to the East Coast to plumlei the colors’ grass paddocks and i ornlielils.

Shortly after the young ducks can fl Vj a beach lagoon may he full id them. Next morning only a few weie lelt. Wlii'ie they went to was unknown till that night on the hilltops settled tho question.

TMK PHANTOM. In Outgo, Canterbury mill Westland •Hid l;:*M« rally miiini'.' tin* inniintiiiiis :i roird i-l; ill ill}.' cry rim niton I” 1 heard m iiighL. The cry niny lie dose in yum •:m :i - i!' tile bird "(i- pa ss ing elu.se. lii ii scciiiiil nr two it :tp]iojirs to gradually (lie till it nets very faint a mile in' tail away, as if the liird tiavelleil with lightning s|ie>il. Then it would cuiiie elnser and eln-ei : lin n away again with the same weiid civ and supernatural speed. The liird cntild never he seen, mid there was mi noise ol wine. Altogether the feeling to anyone was as it a ghost of some hind was hovering ahotit. In (Itano I have lieaid i| called the v.hite ortolan. Or llaast pit his lent nearly knocked down when camped at the head waters ot the Kalinin hv some gigantic bird, which the l)r declared must lie some sort ol giant eagle, kea keas The diggers used to call it the laughing jackass from its mocking cry, and many a pound ot shot was tired to the skies in the vain llO|>e of luineine (toll'll SOlllOt !l 1 llg.

One nielit when in the hush with a Maori the cry was heard, and 1 asked him what it was, giving him no time to manufacture a description. Imr the first time in my life I heard a Maoii say lie didn’t know, and lie appeared to lie rather scared. Some time altertvards I was again in the hush with another Maori and the same weird cry was heard. The native had no douht I icon made ncijuainted with the tlisoomtiuire of Ids countryman a few months before, so when 1 asked the question ahotit the noise he was equal to the occasion. He said ii was a great I,ini called the lluki or llokianga. I forget which, Imt some sound like it. The bird’s plumage was gorgeous in its many glorious colours, and it came from heaven every night, for some unknown purpose, and Hew at such a rate that no one could ever see it. 1 might have got some more woudertnl inlormatioii had I not foolislhx asked him Imw it tile bird Hew so last' that tin one evei saw it, lie could tell it had such glorious plumage. The old cannibal collapsed and sulked tor a week after.

Now' I was jierfectly aware that as is usual when asking a Maori anything about his country it lie does not know lie manufactures. Still there is generally a vein of truth to lie found even in the wildest flights of lictinll. There is such a name as Iloki. It is the native name for the frigate bird, which occasionally Ims been seen in the extreme north of the Auckland district. Its speed of flight would certainly agree with the bird 1 am writing about, hut the gorgeous plumage won’t come m. and the Southern Alps is not a likely spit for such birds even to breed in.

A good litany years alter I got my information about the lloki I was camped one night on a high mimiitaiii spur as I was only waiting lor daylight. I had no fire, so had a chains* of studying the mysterious noise as it, was a clear moonlight night, hut look as 1 would, although the bird appeared to he at times quite close, 1 never could see anything. Once I thought 1 saw a ghostly looking object go past with a noiseless flight, hut couldn’t lie sure. It appeared as if the bird flew up and down the spur with incredible speed.

Going to near the upper end of the spur I Silt down and waited. In a few minutes the cry commenced, and 1 distinctly saw a large brown or grey bird with a. flight as noiseless as an owl. The cry as usual went down the spur and hack again, but the bird was leisurely sailing above me all the time, and T name to the conclusion that it had it mate down in the spur, and they modified their voices in chorus with each other like the demon bird of Ceylon. Many birds are ventriloquists, notably the kakapo. You may hear their drumming a hundred yards away apparently while in reality the bird ts almost at your leet.

But to return to the Hold. Tit the morning going down the spur to neat the Imsh line the dog made a charge m under a rock and sounds of combat were beard. Running up, there was a dead bird and a scattered nest, but no eggs. 1 looked at the bird disgusted. The white ortolan of the. Otago settlers, the mocking bird of the digger, the Hoki with its wings painted with the hues of heaven, the Sarcoramphus llaaslii, or whatever be called it, that wonderful bird which attacked the doctor’s tent, turned out to lie neither more nor less than the common brown sea hawk that no doubt goes occasionally inland to breed like many other sea birds. J am told there are no New Zealand sea hawks. ’lbis may he the case. I am not deeply expert in classifying birds, hut ii not a hawk he is a pirate o! some kind at least. 1 have seen tin tatty times at Open Bay Island attacking other birds and stealing their tisli from them. Whatever it is it must he well-known to science; it at least is not the frigate bird.

The only hitch in my narrative is— Was the bird the dog caught ami the bird 1 saw and heard in the moonlight one and t*he satin*.'' I think so; still it is an open question. \\ hat a pity I had not a gun at the time that would have settled the question nine for all, as the one in the moonlight was decidedly the mysterious skirlcr so oltcn heard in the hush and mountain spurs. STB AY BIRDS.

With the exception of the two ruekous and maybe the heron and striped quail, I know of no regular birds of passage that visit this Island. New Zealand is too far away from any •other land to get many stray birds. Still ;i few have hecii seen, although 1 have never come across any. One strange bird was got on Gillespies bench, and it was found to he a native el Austialia. II was sent to Hokitika, bill what became ol it no one seems to knoll. A dove came to my hot once. Inn it had evidently escaped Iroin some passing ship, as il was perfectly tame and wouldn’t leave. It was rather pleased at having my protection.

Another time a white cockatoo travelled down the Coast, visiting every hut on tin- benches like an experienced snndoii tier. It uas caught several limes, hut always let away. He didn’t stop long at one plaie. hut worked his way south to the I Inly lord, where be linallv disappeared. The bird no duuhi escaped from Hokitika and had to keep the beaches, because if lie went inland the native birds would mob him as is their habit with escaped tame birds of

whatever species. IMPORTED BIRDS

Having now «j;ivt*n an act'd lint ot the principal native* birds in Westland I will next say about those birds wlio have boon introduced whether w isely or otherwise remains to be seen. The Aeelimatisntion Society’s plan appears to have been to introduce a bird <>i beast, never mind its habits or suitability to a country, then ill a tew years start poisoning them. The Home birds even when brought round the globe still retain the hereditary instinct which for generations lias protected them from guns, men and small buys. So when they came out to the Colonies bhey were hound to thrive, as they bail few enemies and unlimited count i \ to spread over. Another reason why imported birds or animals thrive so well is this. All birds and animals, even man himself, when brought to a. new and practically uninhabited country breed abnormally at first. The native birds in whole districts bail disappeared, so the imported liirdb bad as it were ;i new country to spreml over uiul spread they will, and probably finish oil* the few native birds that still hold their own. THK BLACK SWAN.

This is about one of the first birds imported into this Island, tor what mason the Lord only knows. They are not exactly a thing ot beauty on a sheet of water, not having the grace the white swan possesses and they aro not so beautiful as the grebe, a bird t hcv bear more resemblance to titan a swan. On land they always to my mind look like a football with two pipe stems on one end and part of a broom Handle on the other end. In pictures. 1 have always seen them represented as swimming like a white swan with arched neck and wings hitched up. They mav do so in other countries, hut. 1 never saw them do it in 11 estlaml. Like their relation the white swan, they are not much good to eat, tasting liko a very coarse paradise duck. The black swan' was religiously protected for years and 1 am not sure if they are not so still. Yet tljey have become fish caters and will become a nuisance 1»‘fiiic lung, and the worst of it is they have such unlimited country to breed in. The swamps, lakes and inland lagoons of Southern Westland where there are few inhabitants will always he a breeding ground, and soon they will swarm in thousands as no one can get at them in those places, fishing appears to lie an acquired accomplishment, as at first they were strictly vegetarians. They have now raised fishing to a fine art, clubbing together and driving the tisli into shallow water in a style that must make the shag green with envy. The first place the black swan made its appearance in Westland was in Oknrito, but it was several years before they raised any young as the place is a tidal lagoon and when blocked up the whole surroundings arc Hooded so theii eggs were destroyed, hut the intelligence which led them to drive fish came to the front and devised-' t lie floating nest. They mowed a circle among the tushes, sometimes twenty feet in diameter, then collecting the rushes in a .heap the hen bird nested on the top and hurled defiance to floods and tides. The circle of uncut rushes prevented the heap from drifting away. Hut it is only in Oknrito and a few other places that the bird makes a floating nest. Where it is not required

they are not so very particular, nesting in a bunch of toitoi or a flax bush near the water’s edge. The black swan is the only bird 1 am acquainted with that uses.an English oath. When approaching their nest the male bird says, “To hell.” However, a little imagination is required to make it out. Sometimes a tame one that had liecii caught young may be seen about a settler’s place, and he is the most miserable out ol place looking object when in that state, swimming about in a dirty farm yard puddle with a dim idea in his head that this is not the life lie was created for. (To be continued).