280 Transactions. 



the camp daily for some time and found newly killed sheep 

 almost every day. Some would be lying dead in the camp 

 without any outward sign of a wound, but on skinning them 

 there would be a spot of bruised blood on the spinal cord. 

 Others would be torn and bleeding from a wound over the 

 kidneys, generally black and swollen, just as if the sheep had 

 died from blood-poisoning." 



Mr. Turton, of Peel Forest, Canterbury, writes, " Others you 

 find with a hole so small that you could scarcely get your finger 

 in— merely a scratch — but they would mope about, and die in a 

 few days. If you skin these sheep, as I have done, you will find 

 that it is as black as ink, and smells something vile. The bird's 

 bill is, in my opinion, poisonous to sheep." 



It seems as if in some cases blood-poisoning is caused, but 

 it certainly is not always so, as is proved by the number of 

 sheep which come into the sheds every year marked with kea- 

 scars, but otherwise quite healthy. 



Why so pew Keas are seen attacking Sheep. 



It has often been asked, If the kea does so much damage 

 to the flocks, how is it that so few people have ever seen the 

 bird at work ? The answer to this question is easily found by 

 studying the habits of the bird. It is largely nocturnal, being 

 especially lively in the early morning and the evening, and, if 

 we may take the circumstantial evidence, it appears to do most 

 of its work at night. 



Mr. Reginald Foster, " Hasledon," Christchurch, discussing 

 this subject in a letter to me, says, " I fear, however, that it 

 will be difficult to obtain the evidence of eye-witnesses, because 

 the keas work in the night and very early in the morning. 

 . , . The work is done, too, pretty high up on the ranges, 

 where the musterer or shepherd perhaps does not reach until 

 8 or 9 o'clock in the morning." 



Mr. R. Guthrie, in writing to the Timaru Herald, says, " In 

 my opinion the kea, which is of nocturnal habits, does chiefly 

 all its mischief at night or on very dull, foggy days, and never 

 shows its true character in sunshine." 



Mr. J. Logan, of Double Hill Station, Canterbury, writes, 

 *' The reason why there are not more eye-witnesses to the 

 ravages of the kea is that the time of its attack is at night or on 

 foggy days." 



Messrs. R. Urquhart, W. N. Ford, and many others give 

 similar evidence. 



It can be seen from what these men say that, owing to the 

 time when the kea does the killing, and the distance from the 



