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FOREST AND STREAM. 
[July 31, 
New Zealand’s Night Parrot. 
In New Zealand they do many things very 
differently from the way most of us know, es¬ 
pecially in matters of government and public 
service. Reports of public servants are not the 
dry, formal compilations of facts and figures 
which we glance at and throw away. Some New 
Zealand public documents are mighty interest¬ 
ing reading. 
The government of New Zealand has set aside 
Resolution Island and some smaller islets off 
the southwest coast of what may be called the 
south mainland as refuges for native birds, and 
has stationed men there to take care of them. 
Richard Henry is the chief caretaker, and his 
official report is some of the interesting reading 
published by the New Zealand Government. 
This is a part of his report on the kakapo, the 
flightless parrot of Maoriland: 
The great ground parrot of 
New Zealand is called “kakapo” 
by the Maori. I think it is the 
largest and the only one out of 
the great family of parrots that 
cannot fly. Probably its ances¬ 
tors could fly, and, like the rails, 
came here on the wing; but the 
absence of enemies on the ground, 
and the abundance of food, al¬ 
lowed the muscles of the wings 
to degenerate and those of the 
legs to develop, until now they 
are fairly good runners, and their 
wings are only for ornament, or 
at most to prevent them being 
hurt from a fall, for they love 
to climb about among rocks and 
trees in search of berries and 
seeds. 
There is evidence that a great 
hawk once lived in New Zealand, 
and even now there is a fierce 
little hawk that delights in knock¬ 
ing down birds on the wing, so 
that the kakapo’s forefathers 
ground under ferns during the day, but the great 
majority prefer to take up their quarters in hol¬ 
lows and dens in the moss among the roots of 
trees, where they sit on a root in the gloom 
all day, and only come out in the dusk of the 
evening. So well does their color accord with 
the yellow and green of the ferns that it is 
impossible to see them unless they move. Of 
this they are well aware, and often keep per¬ 
fectly still even when within arm’s length. They 
are simple, poor things that know nothing of 
enemies. Once when without a dog I met one 
sitting on a stick under a fern a few feet from 
the ground, and went up to have a talk with 
it. It looked at me more in wonder than fear, 
until I chucked it under the chin, when it as¬ 
sumed a fierce attitude and protested in its 
hoarse voice, but made no attempt to go away, 
and when I let it alone for a few minutes it 
Kakapo (Stringops habroptilus). 
may have been forced to give up flying, those 
alone surviving that took shelter in the under¬ 
growth. Its breastbone has just the trace of a 
keel, so that it must have taken a long time to 
alter its shape to what it is—so long a time 
that kakapos may be truly said to be one of 
the heirs of the ages. And just now the “lords 
of creation” have imported ferrets and weasels 
that prey on all such things that sleep on the 
ground, and, as kakapos cannot be expected to 
learn in a day what their race had forgotten 
for thousands of years, the chapter of their his¬ 
tory is in all likelihood coming to a close. 
Fortunately they have many friends, and the 
New Zealand Government takes a kindly interest 
in their affairs, and has appointed two reserves 
and men to put them out upon islands with some 
of their helpless neighbors, where, if fortune 
favors, they may long survive. 
Kakapos may be called night birds and fruit- 
eaters, which is an unusual combination of char¬ 
acters, but they also eat grass, leaves, and some 
fungi when the fruit is over. They chew their 
food more effectually than any other birds that 
I am acquainted with. For this purpose there 
are diagonal grooves in the upper mandible, in 
contact with which the lower acts in the manner 
of a steel mill. Some of them rest on the 
coolly put its head under its feathers and went 
to sleep again. 
They have their family ^quarrels, of course, 
and sometimes scandalous fights, for I have 
found both males and females with their eyes 
seriously injured and old scars on their heads, 
and it is by no means a very rare thing to find 
a female with only one eye, for it is their mis¬ 
fortune to have powerful beaks and claws. I 
must never put two in one cage, for they seem 
to blame each other for their trouble, and start 
fighting at once. 
The tail of the female is longer than that of 
the male, and she is greener in color, with less 
yellow on the head and breast. She is also 
less in size, and seldom very fat like her lazy 
mate—if ever she has a mate in the ordinary 
sense of the term, for they are the most soli¬ 
tary of birds. She makes her nest on the ground 
in some of the mossy dens, and lays from two 
to four white eggs like those of the harrier 
hawk. I never found two birds in the one den 
at any season, though there is room for a dozen, 
and I think that the male never goes near a 
nest, and knows nothing about it. 
They only breed every second year—not inde¬ 
pendently, but all breed one season and none 
the next—and it is a great puzzle to naturalists 
why some do not breed in the off sea: 
how they all come to such a unanimous 
ment about it. Months before the ap 
breeding season the male is developing 
sac in his throat, which he can puff up 
drum, and which may act like a soundin; 
to assist in making the curious drummin 
in the spring. This note is not unlike th l 
of the bittern, but is repeated five or si; 
in succession, and can be heard at a gr: 
tance. It excites curiosity not easily si 
and has caused some discussion and di 
of opinion. A surveyor of large ex- 
denied that it was a kakapo at all, and ■ 
that it was the rare Notornis; and a’ II 
thority laid it down that the air-sac v: 
outside the windpipe, and therefore n 
nected with the voice; but it is not neces 
air to pass through a drum to make a; 
A whole party of bush:: 
themselves the task of fin 
what it was, and came to 1 
elusion that it was not a ; 
for when they followed 1 
sound and got quite clo 
at night there was a n: 
silence, and then it begs 
half a mile away, so th 
certain it could fly. Bu i 
only another kakapo, wl 
first one may have been I 
elbows. 
I was twelve years on i 
side of the mountains, : 
Anau Lake, and had ai 
portunities for observi' 
habits. I heard their di 
every alternate year url 
which was their due se; 
they did not breed that; 1 
skipped two years in si: 
Now, they must have! 
meeting about the projec: 
ation in their programn 
wonderful meeting it 
doubt, regarding its dec 
not a drummer was heard that year. 1 
the wonder of it we must remember : 
had to come to a decision about si:, 
previously, for the preparation of thei 
so that it could not have been the effe 
fruit and the flowers of that season. 
This is my second year on the wet si£ 
mountains in Dusky Sound, and now It 
the seasons here and at Te Anau co: 
that delegates were needed from botfe 
the Southern Alps, and they all agreec 
I have exhausted all my speculate 
flowers and fruit and physical conditic; 
count for this intermittent season, L 
vain, and generally have to fall bac 
idea that they have useful social law : 
terious as those of ants or bees. 1 
would be acceptable if they lived in o 
munities, but it is difficult to understi 
we know that they are solitary birds 
a rough country so dense with underg:' 
it is all the time like getting through 1 
It appears as if the breeding season i 
trolled by the males, for when there isi 
ming in the early summer there are 1 
young ones. And if they willingly r> 
years in succession what a vision of : 
(Continued on page 196.) 
