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Art. VI. — On the Structure and Habits of the Huia (Heteralocha Gouldi). 

 By Walter Buller, F.L.S., F.G.S. 



("With Illustratians.) 



[Bead before the Wellington PMlosopJdcal Society, November 12, 1870.] 



An article in Nature (June 23) bearing the initials of a well-known naturalist, 

 notices the arrival of a living example of the Huia {Heteralocha Gouldi) at 

 the Zoological Society's Gardens, London. The specimen was a male bird, and 

 the writer in describing the peculiarity in the form of the bill that distin- 

 guishes it from the female, observes, — " Such a divergence in the structure of 

 the beak of the two sexes is very uncommon, and scarcely to be paralleled in 

 the class of Birds. It is difficult to guess at the reason of it, or to explain it 

 on Darwinian or any other piinciples. " 



Although Dr. Hector, with his usual good fortune, has succeeded in getting 

 a fine seiies of specimens for the Colonial Museum, this bird undoubtedly 

 ranks as one of our rarest and most valuable species. Erelong it will exist 

 only in our museums and other collections, and, for the sake of science, it is 

 important that everything connected with its natural history should be faith- 

 fully recorded and preserved. In the absence of any published account of its 

 habits, beyond mere fragmentary notices, I have thought the subject of sufficient 

 interest to justify my placing before the Society the following complete account 

 of all that I have been able to ascertain respecting it. The peculiar habits of 

 feeding, which I have described from actual observation, furnish to my own 

 mind a sufficient " reason " for the different development of the mandibles in 

 the two sexes, and may, I think, be accepted as a satisfactory solution of the 

 problem. 



Before proceeding to speak of the bird itself, I would remark on the very 

 restricted character of its habitat. It is confined within narrow geographical 

 boundaries, being met with only in the Ruahine, Tararua, and Bimutaka 

 mountain ranges, with their divergent sj)urs, and in the intervening wooded 

 valleys. It is occasionally found in the Fagus foi'ests of the Wairarapa Valley, 

 and in the rugged country stretching to the westward of the Ruahine Range, 

 but it seldom wanders far from its mountain haunts. I have been asstired of 

 its occurrence in the wooded country near Massacre Bay (Brovince of Nelson), 

 but I have not been able to obtain any satisfactory evidence on this point. It is 

 worthy of remark that the natives, who prize the bird very highly for its tail 

 feathers (which are used as a badge of mourning), state that, unlike other 

 species which have of late years diminished and become more confined in their 

 range, the Huia was, from time immemorial, limited in its distribution to the 

 district I have indicated. 



My first specimen of this singular bird (an adult female) was obtained in 



