NATURE-AND MAN

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXIII, Issue 275, 3 November 1933, Page 13

NATURE-AND MAN

LOOKING AHEAD WORK FOR WAYSIDE BEAUTY. (Edited by LEO FANNING.) People in all parts of New Zealand should be interested in the progress of the Canterbury Roadside Beautifying Association. At the recent meeting of thia body the secretary reported that letter* asking for support for the association’s aims had been written to 13 mayors of boroughs, 25 chairmen of eounty councils, six chairmen of town and road districts, and six chairmen of county power boards, as well as to the Selwyn Plantations Board, the Waimakariri River Trust, the Canterbury Automobile Association, and the Agricultural and Pastoral Association. It was still too early to expect replies from all of these, but the replies so far received were satisfactory. In addition that association's ideals had been brought under the notice of the Ministers for Employment, Public Works, Railways, Posts and Telegraphs, and Tourist and Health Resorts, and the chairman of the Railways Board. A CALL TO YOUNG FOLK. The best hope for a better New Zealand, from all viewpoints, must be based on the rising generation. This truth is recognised by the Canterbury Roadside Beautifying Association, which is hoping to have the active help of thousands of schoolchildren, particularly for the big tree-planting programme on next Arbor Day. In the United States of America and many other countries campaigns for winning the young folk for the conservation of natural beauty, the making of new beauty and the protection of birds have been carried on with remarkable success. New Zealand is not sufficiently “treeminded,” but there is no lack of wooden-headodness. USING THE NEW LEISURE. “Nature and Leisure” is the heading of a bright leading article in the September issue of the "Nature Magazine,” published by the American Nature Association. “What will we do with more time at our disposal?” the writer asks. “With the progress of science and invention it was as inevitable as the movement of the planets that man’s ability to produce would outstrip his capacity to consume.’ 1 The hours of leisure have been gradually increased in modern times, and the present condition of the world —a superabundance of production—indicates that the average worker’s "time off’ h ill be extender!. Commenting on thr possible uses of such leisure the Anieri can reviewer remarks: — "We have the opportunity to reintroduce millions of people to the out doors and what it contains We hav< the chance to develop an outdoor minded people and to foster that in *MMt in Natan that ■ lut« nt in ■ very hods however much it may have beer stunted by the <*onfining walls of citici or denied by the ,-ousnninig demands o civilisation. “Uns development demands organi sation. One of the most populai activities in our national parks hai been the creation of naturalist service Tt. is work that should be duplicated ii

all areas whore people will go to spend leisure hours outdoors. We have, in various parts of the country, excellent clubs of folks interested in Nature. These groups should grow in number and in members. Many of our school systems have splendid Nature programmes that many times have resulted in the youngsters of the family leading the whole household to an active interest in Nature. This school activity should be infinitely expanded and more generally in vogue.” SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST. Anglers continue to regard the black shag m an enemy of their sport, and cry out for war against the birds. Yet a hasty one-eyed scheme of slaughter may do more harm than good to the trout-streams. Here are the words of Mr Edgar Stead who has often given proof of his view that the shag is not as black as it is painted by its persecutors :— "Most persons will, I think, agree with me that the danger with many of our streams and rivers is not of their depletion of trout but overstockingMost of us also are well aware of the degeneration that takes place in any race that has no natural enemies—where, that is to say, there is no agent that will bring about the survival of the fittest. In the case of trout an eel can be of little use as such an agent, since by eating the ova it destroys the trout before the latter has had an opportunity of showing its fitness or otherwise. A shag, on the other hand, taking trout from 4in. to Sin. long, is almost certain to get the weaker members of a shoal of trout first, the stronger escaping by their superior agility and swimming-powers. I suppose that of the trout in the Avon (a Christchurch river) 10 per cent, are miserable, long, thin kelts, weighing anything up to IJIb. I think you would have great difficulty in finding any such percentage in a stream, where there are shags fishing, and it is my opinion that a few shags fishing in the Avon would soon reduce this percentage there.’’ MATING OF BLACK AND PIED FANTAILS. Mr Edgar Stead mentions that the black and pied fantails interbreed readily. “Indeed,’’ he says, "I have found the nests of only two pairs in which both birds were black, and that was over twenty years ago. Usually two or three pairs of fantails nest in my garden each year, and on several occasions there have been in the same season a cock and a hen of the black variety, each paired to pied birds, so that there does not appear to be any preference on the part of the birds for mates of their own colouring. The young of such mixed matings are always either pied or black —there are no intermediates—and I have never found a nest belonging to a mixed pair that did not contain young of both colourings. There is no fixed proportion of black to pied in the young of such birds, and, more than that, the numbers vary for different broods in the same season of the same pair of birds. A mixed pair which nested in my garden three rears ago. had three pied and one black in their first brood, and two black and one pied in their second.” ANGLERS, TAKE NOTE' The United States Bureau of Biological Survey reports that a dying out of eelgrass along the Atlantic coast from North Carolina to the mouth of

the St. Lawrence River has caused a serious diminution in the number of brant (a species of wild goose) returning from Arctic breeding grounds. This condition is regarded seriously, because the eelgrass is also important in the diet of Canada geese and other waterfond and is the basis of living for mollusc, crustacean and fish.

“How does that affect mo?” a New Zealand angler may ask. That report is a reminder that the scouring of New Zealand rivers by floods sweeps away enormous quantities of material which figures, directly or indirectly, in the feeding of fish. Anglers should be strong supporters of the N.Z. Native Bird Protection Society and other organisations which are always striving for the conservation of protective forests on watersheds, the forests which regulate the flow of rainwater to the rivers.