The North Island Weka

Forest and Bird, Issue 59, 1 February 1941, Page 14

The North Island Weka

(By Wesley Sanderson, of Mata, North Auckland, a pupil at Dilworth School, Epsom, Auckland.)

OFTEN known as a woodhen, the beautiful weka, coloured like autumn leaves, is a fight, very strong, stream-lined bird. It is flightless but has highly developed legs which it uses to great advantage when pursued. The beak is fairly long and thick, with the nostrils placed half-way down. There are four species of weka but it is of the North Island one that I am writing.

The weka is a creature devoted to its own kind but it is the “Evil One” to most other animals. Sometimes it has been regarded as one of man’s enemies, but it does far more good than harm. It might occasionally attack the unprotected young birds of other species, and steal an unguarded egg or two, but it lives almost wholly on insects, snails, etc., and is the arch enemy of rats and mice.

I was once an interested observer of the weka’s method of despatching a rat. The rat was about five feet away from the bird, in whose cruel red eyes shone a devilish light. The weka stalked its prey stealthily until it was within about two feet. Then there was a rush and the rat was dangling from the weka’s beak, its head squashed flat. Next, the rat was placed on the ground and with a quick movement the weka ripped it right up the belly with the middle claw. The skin was torn from the body and left attached to the head only. The weka picked the flesh from the bones and then swallowed the ribs. After this, the skin was manipulated so that the hairy outside was turned inwards and suddenly, to my great amazement, the remains of the rat, skeleton and all, was bolted at a gulp.

A weka will swallow whole young live mice and adult dead ones; but a large mouse is always thoroughly wetted before an attempt is made to swallow it. The weka, incidentally, does not possess a crop, the food when swallowed passing straight into the stomach. As the rat destroys countless eggs and young birds, it will readily be seen that the weka, by destroying rats, is a very great friend and a protector of other birds. Let sportsmen ponder on this before they condemn the weka for attacking young pheasant chicks! How many of these chicks are destroyed by the übiquitous rat or the stoat? I have every reason for believing, as the result of observations, that the weka is an enemy of the stoat, which will attack most other small animals, especially birds, but will not attack a weka.

Although the weka does not possess webbed feet it swims well, and in fact seems to enjoy a dip in the water even when this is icy cold. I have seen them swimming in both salt and fresh water. I remember a little stream running through a bunch of tall, open tea-tree near the beach at Mata on the shores of Whangarei Harbour. In this stream was a hole about eighteen inches deep which was the favourite bathing place of the weka. The number of trails in the mud leading to this hole showed that about a dozen birds must have visited it each night.

One morning when I went to this place I was thrilled to see a number of feathers and a lot of beaten-down scrub, which told of a fierce battle. Although I have never actually seen wekas fight I have seen them chase and jump at one another like steel springs suddenly let loose and then run off into the scrub, giving harsh, loud grunts of “uemm ——uenim” (the “u” and “e” are run together, sounding deeply in the throat). One day when walking through some scrub I was attracted by a weka’s call. The bird was in a clump of bracken and on my approach moved away. I followed it to a small clearing, when to my astonishment a magnificent weka

emerged from the scrub on the opposite side. I stopped still, hardly daring to breathe. The weka stood erect with its tail almost between its legs and with its neck stretched straight up. It thrust its head forward at right angles to the neck and uttered its wild, ringing call (when calling, the weka opens its beak wide and sometimes stretches its neck considerably wider than is normal when it is hunting). In a couple of seconds another weka appeared, which was smaller and also lighter in colour. When it came face to face with the first bird and uttered its call I noticed that the pitch of the call was much higher. I concluded that this second bird was a female, the first a male. I was only about seven feet from the birds and what I saw made me tremble with excitement; the birds were crouching, their necks thrust out straight in front of them, their feathers on end and their wings stuck straight out each side with the feathers pointing upwards. Their red eyes glowing, all of a sudden they sprang at each other and met about three feet up in the air, each pushing the other back with its feet. As soon as they landed they raced one after the other into the protection of the tea-tree. In a couple of minutes the place seemed alive with wekas. I could easily discern the whereabouts of seven, and often saw four at once. I c~., still see as plainly as ever the mental picture of those two happy birds that staged such a great mock-fight almost at my feet.

Wekas always go around in pairs and are very brave in defence of eggs, young or even nest. One day I was watching a pair of wekas going into a clump of rushes with nest material and decided to investigate. I poked my head into the rushes and met one old weka face to face. I gave her a push before she could peck me, but as her mate was already doing his best to make a hole in my feet, I beat a hasty retreat.

Wekas build a variety of nests, the majority of them being built on a slight rise. These nests are about nine inches across and made of grass built up to the height of three or four inches. The hollow is very shallow. (They are early layers, starting in July and August, and they stay with their young many months.) In the 1935-36 nesting season (North Auckland) there were a great number of nests, some quite close to our homestead. On the dry hills the wekas, which were very numerous, made no proper nests, but just scratched a hole in the

ground and piled in a lining of whatever happened to be near, then laid their three, four, five, six or even seven dirty white, purplish brown splotched eggs. In a few weeks during which time the parents brood closely over the eggs, the young birds hatch out and after a few hours they go exploring. It is a sight to see the little birds in the sooty black down that clothes them so perfectly. They are entirely black, legs and beak being a shining black, while the eyes are black with a touch of green. The young birds are slow growers, but slow growth means great strength, and so it is with the weka. In about six weeks the feathers begin to appear and by the end of five months they are fully fledged and are small replicas of their parents. Their eyes change from black to green and then from green to scarlet, while their legs and beak also develop a ruddy tinge. It is about this time the young leave the parents and seek other domains. During the next summer the young ones are still growing in strength and height, and by the following spring they are adults. Each then seeks a mate to whom it will keep true until either of them dies. It is not until they are quite old that they come to the height of their beauty. Then the outer wing feathers are brightly barred and the neck is so strong that the weka is fit to do battle even with a cat.

Towards the end of 1935 the wekas in my district began to decrease in numbers, and by the end of 1936 there were very few of them. Whereas in 1935 the weka yelled his great call from every direction and one could often hear more than a dozen at one time, by the end of 1937 this wild call, that is music to my ears ; was not to be heard. By 1938, however, a few wekas were heard once again a mile or two from our place, and this year, 1940, my joy is great, for once more, almost at our very door, I hear that clear, wild call which shall ever be so dear to me.