Pigeons' Nests.

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLI, Issue 8103, 1 June 1906, Page 2

Pigeons' Nests.

(To the Editor). Sin,—l havo just received a number of your issue of. the 25th inst. containing a letter of Mr Honor.''*; in reference to some remarks which I recently made at the annua! meeting of the Acclimatioa. tion Society. My siajplo utterances have been so gruUsquolv misrepresented in at least ono paper which I have seen that I am not surprised at much misconception exiting in reference to i»y attitude upon the question at iasuo. I am supposed to havo liven expression to the opinion that as their eggs or nesta had never been found in tlio country our cw Zealand pigeon# must pro a urn ably elsewhere. I merely said that I havo never scon or heard of a pigeon's nest being found in my locality, which, when I nettled there, wus an unbroken forest ntretchiog from tho open coast bolt Una to the batta of the Kutthines, And I have asked several bwhineu who had fallen buab over ali this coniury, but no no hat! found a pigeon'* negfc, although one had heard of some being found. I have also asked olfl Maoris—94 #0* called mv&gm aro all close .and limn olworyora of nature —

and they told me thai pigeons' nests 1 wore rarely aeon. 1 though it at one . tirao that tboy must have great breeding j groundfl, as waa the case on the con- | tinent of North America, but as I have never been able to hear of such places, I I cannot now assume that they exist, j At our meeting I spoke oi the pigeon as } a mysterious bird, as tho rare and occasional nest to bo found would not ! appear to indicate tho existence of such j numbers of birds as were to bo seen in j our forests not many years ago. As Mr j Honoro during all his experience of buah life appears to have found only one j neat, his letter rather adds to than 1 diminishes tho force of my contention. — I am, etc., R. C. Brock. Ngaruru, May 29th.