Mates Sought For Captive Male Stoats And Weasels

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29723, 17 January 1962, Page 13

Mates Sought For Captive Male Stoats And Weasels

Mates are needed for a growing collection of male s:oats and weasels assembled in the comfortable quarters provided for them in WelI.ngton by Mr L. Hartman, of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research. Recent additions have brought the tally of stoats to three males and one female, and of weasels to two males and one doubtful. A fanale weasel owned by a Nelson friend of Mr Hartman's, which was to have been mated to one of the males in Wellington, has died and Mr Hartman hopes a young weasel which has just arrived from Ohaupo. near Hamilton, will take its place. The latest stoat to join the party came from Franz Josef Glacier in Westland. It was

caught by a primary schoolboy, Arthur Richards, and sent to Wellington by the Westland National Park ranger, Mr P. F. King. The newest stoat and the newest weasel are each about three months old. Mr Hartman was disappointed when a mother stoat and family of four, found nesting in a tree trunk at Lowburn Ferry, Centra! Otago, escaped from a box in which they had been trapped by schoolchildren. He has also lost stoats from Rangiora and Oxford and a weasel from Waipara. all of which died on the journey to Wellington. He has asked to be informed of the capture of an animal, so that he can make the best possible travel arrangements for it He pavs £1 and ex-'

penses for any adult stoat or weasel—male or female—sent to him, and £5 and expenses for a mother with a live litter.

Weasels are apparently easier to catch than ■ stoats; Mr Hartman believes. Stoats are believed to be far com- ; moner than weasels, but the two species are arriving at' Wellington in roughly equal numbers. Weasels can usually be captured simply by pouncing on them, he says.

Mr Hartman finds that there is still some uncertainty in the minds of the public over the differences between the various mustelids—stoats, weasels and ferrets. Briefly, the weasel is smaller and the ferret larger than a stoat, and the stoat has a “brush” at 'the end of its tai!