Life on Stephen Island

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 202, 23 May 1936, Page 25

Life on Stephen Island

I will tell you of our life on the island. Lots of people think we live in the lighthouse. but that is quite incorrect, as we have a six-roomed bouse for each keeper, and usually there are three keepers on an island station. Our island is one and a half miles long, and three-quarters of a mile wide, and we live on the only flat portion, which is six hundred feet above sea-level, and we often walk to the highest: peak, which is one thousand feet high. We have tuatara lizards here, aud they are very interesting. Last year we had a pet who used to eat black beetles and wetas, which we gave it, but he had a fight with a larger one, and died from injuries received. One of the other keepers has a pet named “Willie, * and he is very tame, even waiting at their doorstep for his feed of beetles. I’ve read some very good stories about the blackbacked sea-gulls and the dove petrels, and how the tuataras saved the petrels from being killed by the gulls. We have about two hundred sheep on the island, and five cows, with one bull. It is very interesting for people from town to watch the lambs being driven down the cliff to the barges. Mv brother, Bill, led the pet lamb down this year, and all the lambs followed. The Government steamer Matai brings our stores every four months, and her visit is eagerly looked forward to, even by our mother and father. — Favourite, Stephen Island.