The Polynesian Dog

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32298, 16 May 1970, Page 5

The Polynesian Dog

(Contributed by the Canterbury Museum)

(11) One of the best descriptions of the Polynesian dog is by Crozet (quoted by C o 1 e n s o, Transactions of the New Zealand Institute, Vol. 25, page 497). Crozet was in New Zealand in 1771, and wrote of dogs in the Bay of Islands. “The only quadrupeds I saw in this country were dogs and rats. The dogs are a sort of domesticated fox, quite black or white, very low on the legs, straight ears, thick tail, long body, full jaws but more pointed than that of the fox, and uttering the same cry: they do not bark like our dogs. These animals are only fed on fish, and it appears that the savages only' raise them for food. Some were taken on board our vessls. but it was impossible to domesticate them like our dogs: they were always treacherous, and bit us frequently.” The latter statement contrasts with Cook's remarks on their tameness. The writer can confirm the statements about the fish diet of the New Zealand dogs. He has examined sub-fossil dog droppings (Tutae-kuri) from Moahunter middens on the Coromandel Peninsula and the Heaphy River, where the finely trimurated bone contained in these droppings could be determined. It was all of fish. Although the interests of writers in the “Maori Dog" last century was great, few zoologists seem to have paid much attention to it. Sir George Grey presented to the British Museum the

skin and skeleton of a “full grown pup,” shot sometime before 1877, between Waikawa and the Mataura plains, Southland. The mounted skin of the mother, a white bitch, also shot at the same time, is on display in the Dominion Museum, Wellington. Otago Museum also has a mounted skin, of a light tawny-yellow colour, on display. This was shot on the Upper Waitotara River. Taranaki "in th 90s" and is the latest record of the kuri known to the writer. Otherwise, we depend for our knowledge of its skeleton on archaeological finds. Mr L.

Lockerbie, of Otago Museum, found an almost complete skelton in sand-dunes adjacent to a midden. Canterbury Museum has many bones, including the almost perfect head, still with dried flesh fragments adhering, excavated at Moa Bone Point Cave. Redcliffs. Whole crania are scarce. Most skulls found in middens have had the back removed, in order to extract the brain, as a delicacy. The third article will deal with the uses, other than food, to which the Maori put the dog.—R.J.S,