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THE ANIMALS OF NE W ZEALAND 



curved, and slender. This appears to be a special adaptation to the manner in 

 which these birds jointly obtain their food; this consisting chiefly of the grubs of 

 the hu-hu beetle. These grubs burrow in decaying wood, which the male chisels 

 out in woodpecker-fashion, while the female probes with her long beak in the hole 

 made by her partner until she seizes the coveted morsel. If, however, she fail in 

 this owing to the insufficient length of her beak, the male comes to her assistance 

 by again pecking at the wood till she is able to secure the grub. In colour the 

 huia is black with a white tail-tip and orange wattles at the sides of the ivory- 

 like beak. Nearly allied is the saddle-back (Creadion carunculatus), which 

 resembles the huia in its orange wattles ; a third species with orange wattles is the 



MALE AND FEMALE HUIA -BIRDS 



wattled crow (Glaucopis cinerea), but these are blue at the base, while in its 

 cousin, Wilson's wattled crow (G. wilsoni), these appendages are wholly ultra- 

 marine. Both species of wattled crows, which, like all this group, form an 

 exclusively New Zealand type, resemble the more typical birds-of-paradise in the 

 softness and gloss of their plumage, but are without the remarkable ornamental 

 plumes. 



Another member of the passerine group to which attention may be specially 

 directed is the tui or parson-bird (Prosthemadera nova-secdandice), which belongs 

 to the honey-eater family (Meliphagidce), and alone represents its genus. About equal 

 to a starling in size, it is for the most part black, with a metallic gloss of various tints 

 and a pair of tufts of curly white feathers on the sides of the throat from which it 

 derives its English name. In a well-known work on the early history of New Zealand 



