NEW ZEALAND BIRDS.

Auckland Star, Volume LVII, Issue 114, 15 May 1926, Page 34

NEW ZEALAND BIRDS.

NATURE LOVER'S OBSERVATIONS.

TJird Lne on Island and Shore," a ilume recently published by William and Sons, is of fascinating terest, for it i 3 all about our own »w Zealand birds, llie author, Mr. H. athrie Smith, has been a keen bird iserver since the eighties, and has folished more than one book about .fural history in the Dominion. They do say there la a kinihip be"eer all life on this globe of ours, d Mr. Guthrie-Smith certainly helps c argument. He is, moreoTer, no mere 7 chronicler of lists of birds, with full d complete record of their anatomical rueture. He calls things by their mmon name, and describes the *Dirde so humanly that you really seem to t to know some of his feathered friends ite intimately. Evidently a man of extingnishable patience, he has itched birds sometimes for eight, nine d ten hours at a stretch, so perhaps is not surprising that he is able to 11 us so many interesting details conrning their habits, particularly at sting time, when birds apparently bemp. very human indeed. The book begins with the sea birds at irangahau, Hawke's Bay, and we are troduced to the Caspian tern, the kittiike, the white-fronted tern, and the i-swallow, or kahawai bird as we call m in the North. The kittiwake, it iy be mentioned, is the bird we call c herring gull or mackerel gull up is way. Then follows an excellent scription of the results of a ten :eks' sojourn on Little Barrier Island, c of our few bird sanctuaries. The ok closes with an account of a holiday one of the mutton bird islands off ewart Island. In the account of what ppened at Porangahau the author res some hint of his methods in obrving the habits of the birds, and ows how by using screens of manuka sh and a diminutive tent he got to thin a few yards of the nesting birds thout disturbing them. We get an :a of his amazing patience in the count of his indefatigable search for c nest of the elusive stitchbird, which most of us know is one of the rarest our New Zealand birds. In the sec>n devoted to the bird life on the ltton bird island the author reaches »h water mark, and invests his feaered friends with a personality. Perps he himself would say that he had scovered their personality. He has a >st intense love of the outdoor, and ;ms to have realised the truth of the st verse of The Ancient Marinei :— "He praveth best who loveth beet. All things both great and small; For the great God who madeth us, He made and loves them all." Having said all this about Mr. ithrie-Smith's book one may men)n what many will think the most maxkable thing about it, and that is c wonderfully beautiful series of totographs with which it is illus»ted. How he managed to snap the rds at such close quarters, passes the mprehension of the person endowed ith merely human endurance and skill, ich plate must represent hours of ttience. There are dozens of these agularly beautiful pictures, admirably produced.

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