MAORI MEMORIES

Wairarapa Times-Age, 3 January 1941, Page 8

MAORI MEMORIES

FISH AND INSECTS. (Recorded by J.M.S.. of Palmerston North, for the "Times-Age."i Early naturalists enumerated 100 varieties of fish round our coasts. The Maoris gave the names of many more in their menu. Except the shark imango), that summer menace to sea bathers, the cod (hapuku) is the largest fish, frequently weighing over 100 pounds.

In summer, immense shoals of fish visit the bays and inlets, and many edible shell fish are in the sands or on the rocks. Even flying fish (ika rere) were often seen near the coast.

In the lakes and rivers great shoals of delicate little fish not unlike the English whitebait, known as inanga, were netted and preserved in fish oil for winter.

Eels in great numbers, known as tuna, some quite 401b5., were trapped in ingenious fish baskets <inaki> and used fresh, dried in the sun. or smoked. The lamprey (pipiharau) comes up the rivers to spawn, and are protected by the sacred law of tapu. Fresh water mussels, also crayfish (koura). are plentiful.

Hundreds of insects thrive in the mild climate, and are scarcely diminished by frost in the mild climate. Mosquitos (ngaeroa) were in limitless numbers near swamps and forests, and were such, a plague to the new arrivals that quite a number left the country.

The Maori blood became immune tc their ill-efl'ects. and these raiders seemed always to choose the while skins a; their victims, even in the dark. Smojc" was the only known means to abate the nuisance.

Spiders were numerous, but only two were slightly poisonous. One was yellow-coloured, and the other was found on sandy shores, and had a red spot on the back Cicadas, grasshoppers and caterpillars were numerous, and many early crops were destroyed by the latter. In 1*350 Mr Brodie, a settler, who introduced pheasants, brought out 300 hedge sparrows.