37 



when persecuted by the dog — except in one single case, when the bird ascended a leaning tree close 

 to our camp, and remained till the dog had given up the attempt to obtain it. But, notwith- 

 standing that almost all the abodes that came under examination were natural cavities, I met with 

 one hole which seemed to have been regularly mined. On the northern bank of the river Haast, 

 just below the junction of the river Clarke, a large flat occurs, formed by deposits of sand, over 

 which a thin layer of vegetable mould is spread, and on which a luxuriant vegetation has sprung 

 up. The river, in washing against these deposits, has in some places formed nearly perpendicular 

 banks, about six to eight feet high. At one spot, about two feet below the surface, several 

 rounded holes were observed ; and the dog tried in vain to enter them. After carefully scenting 

 the ground, he began to scratch the surface with his paws, and soon succeeded in widening the 

 entrance sufficiently to admit his body ; and he immediately afterwards emerged with the bird in 

 his mouth. There is no doubt, in my own mind, that this hole, at least, had been excavated ; and 

 the burrowing-faculty of the bird may be considered so far established. On a flat, in the valley 

 of the Makarora, the dog brought one from the interior of a hollow drift-tree, which was lying 

 amongst sedges and grasses in an old river-channel. There was never more than one individual in 

 the hole, although very often within twenty or thirty yards of it another specimen would be 

 scented out by the dog, the two being generally of opposite sexes. At night-time, in visiting our 

 camp-fire, they generally came in pairs, the two being successively caught by my dog, a single or 

 sometimes a repeated angry growl from the bird informing us that he had hold of it. These cir- 

 cumstances lead me to conclude that during the day each inhabits separately its hole, and that 

 only after dark do they meet for feeding and for social intercourse." 



In his Nelson Eeport*, Dr. Haast informs us that "in former years the Maruia Plains were 

 a celebrated hunting-ground of the Maories for this bird. They generally went there on fine 

 moonlight nights, when the berries of the tutu (Coriaria sarmentosa), a favourite food of the 

 Stringops, were ripe, and ran them down partly with dogs, or even killed them with long sticks 

 upon the tutu bushes. Another mode of capture was, when they had found their holes, to intro- 

 duce a long stick, to which they had fastened several strong flax snares. Feeling the bird with the 

 end of it, they twisted the stick until some part of the bird was caught in the snares, and thus 

 drew it out. The cry of the Kakapo, heard during the night, very much resembles the gobble of 

 a Turkey." 



The Kakapo is said to be still very plentiful in a grassy locality about fifteen miles up the 

 Buller River ; and Mr. Huddleston informs me that it is often met with in the wooded country on 

 the western side of the Nelson Province. 



To these full and interesting particulars of the habits of a bird that is destined ere long to 

 become extinct, I have little or nothing to add. 



A specimen, sent to England by Mr. Murdoch, the Inspector of the Bank of New Zealand, 

 and now in the Zoological Society's Gardens, lives in the same retired way as its predecessor, 

 closely concealing itself in its box by day, exhibiting itself to the public only under coercion of 

 the keeper, and then manifesting the utmost impatience to regain its dark retreat. 



A life-size drawing of this species was given in Gray and Mitchell's ' Genera of Birds' (1S42), 

 admirably coloured, but placed in an attitude quite foreign to the habits of the bird. Mr. Gould 



* Loc. cit. p. 7. 



