FIND OF MOA BONES.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXII, Issue 897, 27 September 1910, Page 3

FIND OF MOA BONES.

Napier, September 26. Mr A. Hamilton, Curator of the Dominion Museum, has just returned from Pohui, where he examined a small cave which had been found on Mr G. P. Donnelly’s run at Ohuraka, at the eastern end of the Pohui bush on the Maungahoro range. The cave was found, Mr Hamilton explained this afternoon, by a rabbiter, whose dog entered it in pursuit of a rabbit. It proved to be about 30ft in length, from 2ft to sft in height, aud about 4ft in width. The entrance was much obstructed by trees aud rocks, but these being cleared away, it was found that the bones of two moas were lying in a heap at the extreme end of the cave. The moas were of the kind called anomaloptery, which, when alive, stood sft in height. One of the specimens was fairly complete, but some of the smaller bones had fallen into interstices of the rock, which formed the floor of the cave, and it was found impossible to recover them, as the space for working was limited, and a crowbar could not be used. The skeleton was somewhat less perfect, but the bones were all in a good state of preservation. It was hoped that possibly the cave might have been a dry one, and that feathers would have been found. Feathers of the North Island species have not yet been discovered. No bones of other birds were found with the moas. The end of the cave where the bones were found was thickly encrusted with deposits from the limestones and some of the bones were also thickly coated.