266 



G. R. WILLIAMS 



species, the southern skua (Stercorarius skua 

 lonnbergi), may be destroyed only when it is 

 actually attacking sheep or lambs, an occa- 

 sional event confined to the Chatham Islands. 

 Destruction of these three common species is 

 not encouraged by the Wildlife Service except 

 when black-backed gulls become too active 

 among colonies of, say, the fairy tern (Sterna 

 nereis], which is very rare in New Zealand but 

 not elsewhere in its range. Otherwise, control 

 of the species is left in the hands of those most 

 affected by their depredations but whose 

 judgment is usually reasonable. 



Marine birds, therefore, are generally satis- 

 factorily protected by law or managed for con- 

 servation in New Zealand especially when 

 one considers the remarkable changes that 

 have occurred in the New Zealand archipelago 

 over the last 200 years. Although the situa- 

 tion could be better, it would certainly have 

 been worse if the Wildlife Service (and other 

 conservation organizations) had not been un- 

 tiring in keeping the general public and the 

 legislature aware of the issues at stake and 

 seen to it that as much as possible of the nec- 

 essary conservation work was done and 

 done before it was too late. 



Acknowledgments 



I thank my Wildlife Service colleagues, 



B. D. Bell, M. J. Imber, D. V. Merton, and 



C. J. R. Robertson, for valuable comments 

 and advice on the preparation of this paper. 



References 



Atkinson, I. A. E., and B. D. Bell. 1973. Offshore 



and outlying islands. Pages 372-392 in G. R. 



Williams, ed. The natural history of New Zealand. 



A. H. & A. W. Reed, Wellington. 

 Bourne, W. R. P. 1967. Subfossil petrel bones from 



the Chatham Islands. Ibis 109:1-7. 

 Kinsky, F. C. 1970. Annotated checklist of the birds 



of New Zealand. A. H. & A. W. Reed, Wellington. 

 Gibb, J. A., and J. E. C. Flux. 1973. Mammals. 



Pages 334-371 in G. R. Williams, ed. The natural 



history of New Zealand. A. H. & A. W. Reed, 



Wellington. 

 Williams, G. R. 1973. Birds. Pages 304-333 in G. R. 



Williams, ed. The natural history of New Zealand. 



A. H. & A. W. Reed, Wellington. 

 Williams, G. R. 1977. Marooning a technique for 



saving threatened species from extinction. Int. 



Zoo Yearb. 17:102-106. 



