
KIWI, 21 
are also employed to construct artificial flies for the capture of fish, 
precisely after the European manner. 
Where found.—The kiwiis a denizen of New Zealand, which 
still survives by virtue of its nocturnal habits and subterraneous 
hiding-place, but in fearfully diminished numbers. The Standard 
of the 26th Sept., 1892, says: ‘‘ The North Island species still finds 
a home in the wooded heights of the Pirongia, and in the bosky 
roves of the Upper Wanganui. But from all other districts where 
ormerly numerous it has disappeared. The South Island form is 
now met with only in widely scattered localities on the west coast, 
and the small spotted or grey kiwi of which a few years back 
thousands could have been obtained, has, Lord Onslow states, suc- 
cumbed to the ravages of the stoat and weasel, the persecution of 
wild dogs, and the necessities of roving gold-diggers, who would put 
a couple in their ‘ billy ’ for supper, until it is now hopeless to expect 
to see many except along the lower wooded ranges ‘of the Southern 
Alps. Haast’s kiwi is one of the rarest of species, whilst apteryx 
maxima is to be seen in the wooded parts of Stewart’s Island alone. 
The various species of kiwi or apteryx, the diminutive representa- 
tives of those gigantic wingless—or rather, short-winged—birds 
which were, in comparatively recent times, so characteristic of the 
New Zealand fauna, are also fast passing away. 
Species. —There are several species of apteryx. Apteryx owenii 
—QOwen’s apteryx, named by Mr. Gould as a just compliment to 
Professor Owen, who so ably investigated the remains of the extinct 
birds of New Zealand. It differs in the irregular transverse barrin 
of the entire plumage, which, together with its extreme density an 
hair-like appearances, gives it more the resemblance of a mammal 
than of a bird ; it has a shorter, nore slender, and more curved bill. 
This is the little grey kiwi. In the museum of Melbourne there are 
specimens of the following species :—Grandis, from Collingwood, 
ew Zealand ; haasti, the roa or large grey kiwi from the South 
Island ; mantelli, from the North Island, and of the kiwi found 
near Okarito. In the Sydney museum there are also several exhibits, 
one of which is a rarity, it being an ‘‘ albino.” 
Acclimatisation.—In 1859 an apteryx of the species mantelli, 
which had been sent to England (referred to below), laid an egg. 
The shell was smooth and of a dirty white colour, its form being an 
elongated oval, slightly tapering towards the small end. Its length 
was 4? inches and its diameter 2°9 inches. The weight of the egg 
was 144 ozs., and that of the living bird was ascertained to be 60 
ozs., so that the egg was nearly equal to one-fourth of the weight of 
the bird. The Sydney M. Herald, May, 1894, says: ‘* Baron Walter 
de Rothschild some months ago presented the museum of Natural 
History at Paris with an apteryx, one of the few specimens of that 
rare New Zealand fowl which have reached Europe alive. No care 
or expense was spared to keep the precious creature from dying. Its 
cage was delicately warmed and luxuriously equipped. Its diet was 
chosen by a select committee. Inthe midst of it all the apteryx 
ungraciously vanished. A hue and cry was made for it everwyhere, 

