AVIAN GENUS MEGAPODIUS IN THE PACIFIC. 755 



Megapode," in that fauna — on what appear to be wholly in- 

 adequate grounds. 



In 1887, Mr. T. F. Oheeseman, the well-known Curator of 

 the Auckland Museum, to whose knowledge and kindness many 

 visitors to New Zealand are indebted, visited the Kermadec 

 Islands, which are a scattered group lying nearly halfway between 

 the North Island of New Zealand and the Tonga Islands to the 

 N.N.E., and some 400 or 500 miles from either. Mr. Oheeseman 

 reported* that a Mr. Johnson, who had resided on Sunday 

 Island (a volcanic island, the most northerly of the group) about 

 fifteen years before, told him that " prior to the eruption of 1876 

 a bird inhabited the floor of the large crater, which made 

 mounds of sand and decayed leaves, two to three feet^ high, 

 laying its eggs in the mounds. He was in the habit of visiting 

 the mounds for the sake of the eggs and young birds, and has 

 frequently taken 5 or 6 of the latter from the same nest at one 

 time." The eruption of 1876 covered the floor of the crater and 

 apparently killed out the species. Mr. Oheeseman cautiously 

 observes that the evidence, such as it is, seems to point to the 

 former existence of a species of Megapodius on this island. 



We may remark that the statement that five or six young 

 birds were taken from the same nest at one time is hardly 

 in accordance with the habits of the genus, for the eggs being 

 laid at some intervals the young ones are not of the same age, 

 and leave the mounds to feed for themselves soon after they are 

 hatched. The statement would be more appropriate to the young 

 of the Gi-ey Duck {Anas sujjerciliosa) which frequents this island. 

 It is the mound-building habit which, as Mr. Oheeseman says, 

 " seems to point " to the existence of a Megapode on Sunday 

 Island. 



Sir Walter BuUer t on the strength of this evidence includes 

 Megapodius pritchardi among the birds of New Zealand, in which 

 region the Kermadec Islands are included. He says : " I have 

 no doubt whatever in my mind — notwithstanding the apparent 

 difference in their nesting habits— that Mr. Oheeseman was right 

 in his conjecture " that the Sunday Id. and Niuafou birds were 

 identical. (It will be noted that Mr. Oheeseman conjectured that 

 the genus, not the species, was identical.) On the discrepancy 

 that whereas the Niuafou bird lays in burrows, the Sunday Id. 

 bird is stated to have built mounds of sand and leaves two to three 

 feet high, he remarks (p. 33) : " If the latter observation was 

 accurate it may have been due to circumstances of locality anu 

 environment, and by no means negatives the assumption of these 

 birds being one and the same species." As we have seen, the 

 statement that the Sunday Island bird built mounds is the only 

 evidence we have of the existence of a Megapode on that island. 



Through the kindness of Mr. Ogilvie-Grant I have had the good 



* " On the Birds of the Kermadec Islands." Trans, and Proc. of the N. Zealand 

 Institute, vol. xxiii. (1890) p. 219. 

 f Supplement to the Birds of New Zealand, vol. i. (1905) p. 31. 



