223 
and shelter ; and the Bush-Hawk seems to be instinctively aware of this. Some years ago I was 
informed that a pair of these birds had bred for several successive seasons in a nest placed as described, 
and situated in the high fork of a dead kahikatea tree near the Horowhenua Lake. Having waited 
for the breeding-season, I offered the natives a half-sovereign each for the eggs ; but, although 
excellent climbers, they failed in all their attempts to reach the nest. They afterwards observed the 
Hawks carrying mice, lizards, and small birds to their young ; and the latter, on quitting the nest, 
were shot and destroyed. When I last visited the spot the old kahikatea was still standing, and the 
bunch of withered Astelia , which had cradled several successive broods, was still clinging to the tree ; 
but the persecuted Hawks had quitted their exposed eyrie for some more secure retreat. 
In the summer, however, of 1867, during a visit to Taupo, I was fortunate enough to find the 
nest of this species. We had fixed our bivouac for the night on the banks of the Waitangi Creek, 
only a few miles from the base of the grand snow-capped Buapehu. Our native companion soon 
detected the old Hawks carrying prey to their young, and on the following morning he discovered 
the nest *. It was situated on the ground, under cover of a block of trachyte, which cropped out of 
the side of the hill. There had been no attempt to form a proper nest ; but the ground was covered 
with the feathers of birds (almost entirely those of the Ground-Lark) on which the young Hawks had 
been fed. The latter were three in number, of different sizes, the largest being apparently three 
weeks old, and the smallest scarcely a fortnight. They were extremely savage, striking vigorously 
with their sharp talons and uttering a peculiar scream. While we were engaged in securing them in 
a basket the old birds were flying to and fro, occasionally dashing up to within a few feet of us, and 
then off again at a sharp angle, alighting at intervals, for a few moments only, on the rugged points 
of rock above us, but never uttering a sound. They were in perfect plumage ; and when they 
occasionally poised their bodies overhead, with outspread wings and tail, they presented a very 
beautiful appearance. During our journey of forty miles through the bush, the gun supplied the 
young Hawks with a sufficiency of food ; but they were very voracious, two large Pigeons per diem 
being scarcely enough to appease their joint appetites. Fifty miles more by canoe, and about forty 
on horseback, brought the captives to their destination, when they were placed in a compartment of 
the aviary. They continued to be very vicious, punishing each other severely with their claws. The 
youngest one was an object of constant persecution, and ultimately succumbed to a broken back. A 
small tame Sea-Gull that had unwittingly wandered into the aviary, through an open doorway, was 
instantly pounced on, although the young Hawks, in their unfledged condition, could only move by 
hopping along the ground. In about three weeks these birds (which proved to be male and female) 
had fully assumed the dark plumage ; and for about two months after they were very clamorous, 
especially during wet or gloomy weather. By degrees they became less noisy, till at length they were 
perfectly silent and moody, never uttering a sound for weeks together, with the exception of a peculiar 
squeal when they were fighting. A more quarrelsome couple never existed. The female, being the 
larger and stronger bird, generally came off best, leaving the male severely punished about the head. 
At the end of six months the climax was reached by her actually killing and devouring her mate. I 
found the aviary strewn with feathers, and the skeleton of the poor victim picked clean ! The 
surviving bird underwent a partial moult in the month of September following, and the plumage 
began to assume a spotted character. The legs also became slightly tinged with yellow. By the 
beginning of March in the following year she had acquired the full adult plumage, except that the 
throat and spots on the sides were not so light as in more mature examples. The legs had changed 
to a pale greenish yellow, and the irides from lustrous black to a dark brown colour — the cere 
retaining its pale blue tint, but with indications of a change to yellow. After two months’ absence I 
* Captain Hair, writing to mo in February 1880, says : — “ The Sparrow-Hawks still build at the cliff on the Waitangi 
Stream where we obtained our young birds in 1867.” 
