WAIKARI MOA SWAMP

Press, Volume LXXXIV, Issue 25447, 19 March 1948, Page 6

WAIKARI MOA SWAMP

IMPORTANCE OF FINDS EMPHASISED INVESTIGATIONS ON BED OF OLD LAKE “Canterbury people should realise the importance of the deposits which the Canterbury Museum has the privilege of working at the moa swamp an Pyramid Valley, Waikari,” said Dr. R. A. Falla, director of the Dominion Museum, Wellington, and former director of the Canterbury Museum, Christchurch, in an address on moa research to the Friends of the Canterbury Museum last evening. „ Dr. Falla said it might be suggested that workers could take a bulldozer or

a grab into the swamp and remove literally tons of moa bones from the yellow pug which underlay the upper layer of peat. However, it had been found that the more laborious but also more scientific way of removing the bones by hand from a lateral working face was the most efficacious. Moas were found in the approximate positions in which they died and it was possible to assemble complete individual skeletons with the minimum use of bones from other birds. The swamp had been formed by the evaporation of an old lake. The layer of yellow, quaking pug in which the moa skeletons had been so admirably preserved was composed of billions Of minutes aquatic organisms, about which, until recent years, comparatively little was known. When the first investigations were made in the Waikari swamp, scientists had been baffled by the composition of the pug; then Professor E. Pertival, of Canterbury University College, had identified some of the organisms found. Further investigations had been placed in the hands of a Czech specialist in Prague, and before the outbreak of war in 1939 this scientist had been able to forward an enthusiastic preliminary report on the equatic remains. Efforts had been made to resume contact with this scientist after the war, but up to the time of the recent coup in Czechoslovakia they had been unsuccessful. Other Finds in Swamp Besides the well-preserved moa bones found in the swamp, other finds of great importance had been made, Dr. Falla continued. The contents of the moas’ gizzards had been preserved and the vegetation they contained had remained remarkably fresh. Botanists had been able to identify leaves and other vegetable matter. The moa had been an undiscriminating feeder on the vegetation which had once surrounded the swamp—which was then a lake—and twigs had been recovered which plainly showed the marks of moa beaks. Moa eggs had also been found among the bones, as well as the remains of other birds, some of which were extinct.

Dr. Falla outlined the progress of research on the moa since the discovery of the first identified moa bone in 1837 by an early trader named Harris in the Gisborne district. This bone had been sent to Sir Richard Owen, the notefl English comparative anatomist, and he had pronounced it to be the bone of’a bird. The discoveries of bones multiplied, and Owen lived to see a complete skeleton of a moa. Dr. Falla referred to the discovery of other large wingless birds similar to the moa in Madagascar. These birds had provided the background for the giant roc encountered in the Sinbad stories. A recent paper prepared by a young scientist for the American Museum of Natural* History showed that the moa was a comparatively light bird. This paper claimed that the maximum weight of a moa was about 3001 b. compared with about 6001 b for the Madagascan wingless bird. Size of Moas The largest moas. continued Dr. Falla, probably stood at about Bft or Bft 6in in height, stretching up to 10ft at times. In addition to skeletal finds, certain mummified remains of moas had been found in caves in areas of Central Otago, where ’the climate, lacking moisture, had enabled their preservation. From these remains had been gathered an idea of what the feathers of the moas were like. It had been suggested that the male moa was much smaller than the female, and Ihat, as in the cases of similar extant birds, the male undertook the care and rearing, of the chicks.

Dr. Falla added that no human remains had been found at the Waikari

swamp, and the presence of certain kinds of moa in large numbers also suggested that the deposits belonged to a pre-human period, or at least w a period when humans had not penetrated to the district