PROTECTED BIRDS

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 136, 30 August 1927, Page 7

PROTECTED BIRDS

WHANGAREI PROSECUTIONS

At the Whangarei Magistrate’s Court yesterday, before Mr. E. Cutten. S.M„ Robert Lomas. Matthew Whitelaw, William Henry Birch and Thomas Caplin were charged with being in possession of protected birds, to wit, three kiwis, a kingfisher and a rail. A similar charge against William Fraser, curator of the Whangarei Museum, was withdrawn by the police. Counsel for defendant Lomas said that he was out shooting in July and the rail, a bird that he had never before seen, got up, and he fired at it thinking it was a teal. When he saw it was an uncommon bird he sent it to Mr. Caplin, who is a taxidermist of no mean ability, to mount for the museum. In the case of Whitelaw, defendant was travelling along the road in lrs car, and saw a kiwi lying dead. and fairly advanced in decomposition lying by the roadside. He brought it in to the curator and had nothing more to do with it. Senior-Sergeant O’Grady, who prosecuted, said undoubtedly defendant acted in good faith, and had Mr. Fraser, the curator, applied for permission from the Department of Internal Affairs doubtless nothing more would have been said. In the case of defendant Caplin, the senior-sergeant said he had mounted these birds and displayed them in his tobacconist’s window, not knowing that, in New Zealand a licence as a taxidermist was necessary. He had practised this art a good deal at Home, but had not followed it up in New Zealand. PUBLICITY NECESSARY The police did not ask for a heavy fine, hut wanted publicity given so that the people of this country should realise that these and other birds enumerated in the Gazette were absolutely protected. The magistrate said he would take notice of this recommendation and considered the case would be met if each defendant was convicted and ordered to pay costs 10s. As an application was before the Department of Internal Affairs with regard to the birds he would make no order in connection with their disposal.