Best. — Maori Forest Lore. 261 



W^heu young kaka are taken from these nests and cooked for food, then 

 it is highly essential that the ashes of the fire at which they were cooked 

 should be taken to the tree and cast into the hollow where the nest is situated. 

 If this be not done, then the parent birds will desert that tree and never 

 again nest therein, but will seek and select another hollow tree elsewhere, 

 this new nest being known as a puta tvhaka/piri. For such are the thoughts 

 of the Maori. 



The kaka is sometimes troubled with a parasite, a kind of worm called 

 ngaio, and when so affected is very thin. The worm sometimes found 

 in the kokopu fish is called by the same name. 



" He kaka kai uta, he manga kai te moana " (A kaJca on land, a barracouta 

 in the ocean) is an old-time saying, both being famously voracious where 

 food is concerned. Also, the parrot rends wood as the above fish rends 

 a net. The kaka is often found in the forest by the fowler hearing pieces 

 of wood drop from where a parrot is rending a decayed limb in order to 

 get at the grubs therein. 



" He fakura ki te po, he kaka ki te ngaherehere " (A swamp-hen at night, 

 a, kaka in the forest). These two birds mark, by their cries, the passing of 

 the hours of darkness. 



■' He wahine ki te kainga, he kaka ki te ngaherehere " (A woman at home, 

 a parrot in the forest). Another simile. Women and parrots, the two 

 noisiest creatures known to the neolithic Maori. {E tania ! Ko te ahi taica 

 hai whakarite.) It is with much pain that the pakeha transcriber places 

 this saying on record. Nothing but a stern sense of duty enables him to 

 do so. 



When Maruru hinted to his people that it would be a good thing to slay 

 Tu-te-mahurangi he said, " Ka eke te kaka parakiwai, kaua e takiritia ; 

 ka eke te kaka kura, takiritia'^ (If a common brown parrot mounts the 

 snare-perch, do not snare it, but if a scarlet parrot mounts it, then snare 

 it). By this the people understood that they were to slay the chief, but 

 spare his people. This item is from Colonel Gudgeon's pamphlet on the 

 Ohura evidence. 



Kakapo (Stringops habroptilus ; Ground-parrot). — This bird is no longer 

 found in the Tuhoe district, but was at one time numerous at certain places, 

 such as the Parahaki lands, on the head-waters of the Waiau River, and 

 at Te Whakatangata, and other such wild, rough forest lands. When some 

 members of the Ngati-Mahanga clan went a-hunting kakapo at the latter 

 place it was a trespassing on the lands of Ngati-Tawhaki, who promptly 

 slew, cooked, and ate the offenders. 



Kakapo were numerous in former times at Ngatapa, near Manuoha. 

 Their holes were seen in long rows at that place. 



Natives say that kakapo live together in flocks ; each flock has its own 

 range of feeding-grounds, and its own camp, or whaivharua. Each bird has 

 its own hole (pokorua) at the camping-place. Each flock has its leader, 

 called the tiaka, which is said to be always a small-sized bird. It is called 

 tiaka on account of its smallness (" tiaka = A^m., mother," is the only meaning 

 assigned to this word by Williams). At night the birds come forth from 

 their holes and collect on a common meeting-ground at the whaivharua. 

 This place is a playground for all the birds of that particular ivhaicharua. 

 Having all gathered together, each bird now goes through a singular per- 

 formance, beating its wings on the ground and making a roaring sound, at 

 the same time making a hole in the ground with its beak. The Maori 

 says that these birds collect to tangi. During the above performance the 



