FROM NATURE'S BOOK

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXVII, Issue 17948, 15 November 1918, Page 2

FROM NATURE'S BOOK

NOTES ON NATURAL HISTORY TS NEW ZEALAND. (By J- DRUMMOND, F.L.S., VJS£.) A very prompt response was made to an appeal.by Sergeant L. I). Ayson, dispenser at the Rotorua Military Hospital, in this column, for information as to the comfrey plant in New Zealand. He has received about fifty letters on the subject. These have placed in his hands interesting and important facts. Tho comfrey is not included in lists of foreign plants that have established themselves in this country, but it is evident that it should bo added. Bet-wecn thirty-five and forty years ago several correspondents brought large quantities of comfrey roots from England to New Zealand, in order to establish the plant as cattle feed. Even the smallest! part of a root grows. The plant, therefore, spread rapidly, and as it is eradicated only with difficulty, it soon escaped from cultivation and became wild. It is plentiful near llotorua, and oven in the town, and Sergeant Ayson did not know this until the response to his appeal supplied the knowledge. He has received letters from nearly all parts of New Zealand, offering to forward root's if he requires them. This shows that th© plant certainly is not rare here.

He has replied to all the correspondents, explaining that as supplies have boon discovered close to tho hospital, h is not expedient to incur expense and trouble by sending tho plant from a distance. He has promised to communicate with them again if his stock is likely t'o be greatly reduced. In the meantime he wishes to thank the correspondents for their thoughtfulness and for the trouble they have taken. Without) their help ho would not have been able to carry on tho work of manufacturing a liquid to relieve soldiers' wounds. From roots in his own district he intends to plant largo beds of eomfroy in Rotorua, and it seems that he will have sufficient to meet all the needs of the soldiers in the military hospital there. He is trying to make the healing liquid yielded by the plant perfect, in order that it may bo used in other military hospitals in New Zealand. Ho states that the generous response to his appeal has rendered it possible for him to do this.

Mr \V. Duncan, Milton Otago, has asked mo if there is any difference\in tho temperature of .the sea on the east and on the west coast of New Zealand. This question was investigated by Sir James Hector some fifty years ago. He found that the coldest part of the sea around New Zealand, is on the south-east coast of Otago- The temperature of the surface water there ranges from -19 dog in the winter to 57deg in the summer. This shows that there is a eolcl current, which, apparently, extends its influence up the east coast of the South Island as far as Cool' Strait. The temperature of the sea on the western sides of both islands is considerably higher. It is equal to the temperature, in six degrees of latitude further to tho north on the cast coast. In the extreme south the temperature docs not rise to tho same exteut, but there is evidence that the warm equatorial current that is known to skirt the east coast of Australia, and has been compared to its southern counterpa"t in the Gulf-stream of the Atlantic Ocean, must be directed against the west coast of New Zealand and has a tendency to equalise the temperature in that region.

In support of this theory Sir James Hector stated that while the red whale feed and multitudes of forms of medusa in summer are- seen on every part of the New Zealand coasts, the sea on the extreme south-west coast in winter i» made almost gelatinous bv myriads of marine creatures, which belong properly to tropical seas. Fifty-five years ago "he saw the phosphorescent displays of tho great communities of these creatures near tho entrance to the Southern Sounds quite as wonderfully developed as, according to an English naturalist, they am under the Equator. Large numbers of flying ash and occasional visits from the caper nautilus and the true nautilus are accepted as evidence of a warm current from tho north, extending alone the north-east, coast of New Zealand as far south as tho Bnv of Plenty. This current apparently, docs not pass down flic east coast, as there is a steady drift from New Zealand to the oast. It takes to the Chatham Islands. Mr H. H Travcrs. who investigated the natural history of the Chathams years ago. reported that some totara sleepers that broke adrift from Pigeon Bay during tho earthquake ware in 1868 were cast up on the Islands. Sir James Hector expressed an opinion that tins tropical current, sweeping from tho East Cape to the Chathams, created "The Banks.'' a name used by whalers for an expanse which was one of the far-' ourite feeding grounds of the sperm whale,

" We hare had a turn of very bad weather in tins district.'' Mr A. Wilson wrote from Hangatiki, about six miles from To Kuiii, on September 29. ,: lt began with a snowstorm about July 22, and continued to bo inclement' for almost a month. This, directly and indirectly, has caused groat* mortality amongst all kinds of stock. Ihe first part of the blizzard was so strong that it blackened mpsii of the'tender plants, notably the 'passion-fruit, the oranges and the lemons. The frosts hit even the ta'was, where they arc directly exposed. The hangi-hangi was bleached even in sheltered places. The ponga and other fern-trees look as if a fire bad swept over them. Before the blizzard six or eight fantnils flitted around the bouses and amongst the trees at our homestead. Occasionally one came through a door or window into a room. They have not' been seen since the snow. I was camped at Mr Rolleston's place, near the llauginni Range, about fifteen miles east of To Ktrifci. Mr Holloston told me that, before the storm, there were hundreds of fantaiU near the edges of his clearings, but all have disappeared. I hare seen only one fantail since the snow, ■ilihough' I have been in the forest most. of the time. What has become of them? Have they migrated or died?"

During the cold weather in July, Mr W. Benton reports from Featherston, ons of large eels were cast up on tlio northern shore of the Wairarapa Lake. T n the distance they looked like masses y'i driftwood. The head of the lake there is shallow, not more than ton or twelve feot' deep.