3902 The Zoologist — Maech, 1874. 



apparent object than to excite their alarm. We have noticed sheep 

 and cattle grazing close to a nest without causing any anxiety to 

 the birds, yet a cat, or human being, would be immediately attacked. 

 We have seen our handsome butterfly {Pijramels) sunning itself 

 unmolested just above a nesting-hole at which a pair of kingfishers 

 were at work, yet after the young had flown we found the bottom 

 of the chamber covered with remains of thousands of insects, 

 including the gauzy wings of our largest dragonfly. At Ohinitahi, 

 in the breeding-season of 1871, we knew of three nests containing 

 in each seven eggs, one nest with six, and another with five eggs. 



Thrush (Keropia crassirostris. Gray); "pio-pio" of the natives; 

 "thrush" of the settlers. — In writing on the natural history of our 

 birds, the bewailment of their lessened numbers has come to be a 

 matter of course; the rapid settlement of ihe country has, in the 

 case of the thrush, limited its range greatly, few birds having 

 retreated with so much haste before the eflTorts of the cultivator. 

 Let us take a section of this island, say one hundred miles in width, 

 including Banks Peninsula, and stretching from the eastern to the 

 western shore ; this will afl'ord some information as to its present 

 habitat. Within this range, at one time, the pio-pio might be 

 found in any bushy place, not too far from water, where belts of 

 shrubs aflforded shelter and abundance of seeds; ten years at least 

 have passed since we heard of its occurrence in this neighbourhood 

 (Governor Bay) ; on Banks Peninsula i)roper it is now scarce ; in 

 the bush-dotted gullies of the Malvern Hills, the Thirteen-mile 

 Bush, Alford Forest, and many other localities, it was not very 

 uncommon ; now, let an enthusiastic naturalist traverse these 

 places in quest of our feathered philosopher, he will find it has 

 become a rara avis indeed. We must pass through these portals 

 of the mountains, the river gorges, to catch sight of the thrush 

 hopping about the openings of the bush, much after the fashion of 

 its English namesake; but even here its numbers have become 

 wofully diminished ; four or five years ago, on either side of the 

 Upper Rakaia, where the bushes descend the mountain slopes, 

 these birds fairly teemed in their favourite haunts, but they are 

 already becoming rare. They may be seen about the bushes that 

 skirt the cold streams of the Havelock, the Upper Waimakariri and 

 the Bealey ; through the romantic gorge of the Otira to the more 

 level ground that stretches away to the Teremakau, it may be 

 frequently seen, always appearing to prefer the timbered forests. 



