1NSECTIVORA 97 



In 1894 the late Mr Peter Cunningham of Merivale, Christchurch, 

 sent a consignment of wekas home and got 12 hedgehogs out in 

 exchange. They were placed in a pigeon-house, but got out under 

 the wire-netting and escaped. For years nothing was heard of them, 

 but they gradually increased, and are now extraordinarily abundant. 

 Mr Edgar F. Stead of Riccarton says (March, 1916): 



If I hunted through my garden with my dog I could get a dozen now, 

 and I frequently kill them .... They are extraordinarily destructive to 

 chickens, their depredations being readily identified by the fact that they 

 eat their victim's stomach first, whereas a cat eats the breast first, and rats 

 and weasels go for the head and neck. Once a hedgehog starts eating 

 chickens, he will go on until caught or the supply runs out. I know of 

 many cases when a trap set and baited with the remains of a chicken has 

 caught the marauding hedgehog. 



An informant at New Brighton tells me (February, 1916) that they are 

 very abundant, and are a pest in the gardens, as they eat the vegetables 

 and dig up the potatoes. They are now (1916) very abundant about 

 Dunedin, and apparently everywhere between Dunedin and Christ- 

 church they are to be found. Mr W. W. Smith introduced two pairs 

 into the Public Park, New Plymouth, in 1913, and they are increasing 

 rapidly. 



Among my correspondents, one who hails (40 years ago) from 

 Surrey, England, is a firm believer in the milk-sucking habit of 

 hedgehogs, and warns me that the milking qualities of cows are 

 frequently destroyed by them. 



Mr C. Hutchins of Omokoroa, Tauranga, states (April, 1913) 

 that many years ago he found a hedgehog thickly infested with a 

 large blue tick, about the size of a small pea. The hedgehog seemed 

 to be more than half dead, but the ticks were apparently thriving. 



T. N, Z. 



