HAUNTS AND HABITS. 39 



Alps, from the Humboldt Mountains in the south to 

 Kelly's Hill in Westland. Although frequently met with 

 on the open alpine and sub-alpine hillside, I consider the 

 bird essentially one of the forest limit, where it may be 

 seen in numbers at the junction of the forest and 

 sub-alpine meadows and in the Nothofagus forest where 

 such are pierced by river-beds." 



In my travels in the back country, I have frequently 

 made the Kea's acquaintance, mostly around the head-waters 

 of the Rakaia River and also around Mount Torlesse, and, 

 though I have seen it up as high as 5000 feet or more, my 

 observations agree entirely with Dr. Cockayne's statement. 



One writer even ridicules the idea of Keas being forest 

 birds, for he says, " I remember being astonished on reading 

 of the Kea living in the forest, for I never, even during 

 the severest winter, saw it perched on trees." It is a 

 well-known fact now that they commonly settle on trees ; 

 as early as 1862 Sir Julius von Haast saw one in a tree 

 near Lake Wanaka, and since his time nuinerous similar 

 testimonies have been borne. 



I have, on several occasions, seen the Kea perching on 

 trees. Once in January, 1903, in a forest behind the Glenthorne 

 Homestead, and while camping for several days near the 

 source of the Avoca river, I and others constantly saw them 

 flying in and out of the forest some 500 feet above us. 



The fact that these birds were seen so low down in 

 summer disproves the old statement of many writers that 

 they come down to lower altitudes only in heavy weather. 

 Each time that I saw them low down it was mid-summer, 

 and the weather was warm and clear. 



At first I thought that possibly the Keas had come to live 

 at low altitudes smce they had developed sheep-killing 

 propensities, in order to be near to their quarry ; but the 

 fact that before they had learned that habit, namely, in 

 1866-67, Sir Julius von Haast saw more Keas below than above 

 snow-line disproves the supposition. The very fact that, in 

 winter, the heavy falls of snow, accompanied by cold biting 

 winds, drive the Kea to lower altitudes, seems to me to 



