Waipoua One Of World's Unforgettable Sights

Northern Advocate, 10 March 1948, Page 3

Waipoua One Of World's Unforgettable Sights

AUCKLAND, Wed. (P.A.). —“One of the stunning, memorable and unforgettable sights of the world.” This is how Dr Robert Cushman Murphy, world authority on wild life and a specialist in ornithology, describes the Waipoua kauri forest.

Dr Murphy is chairman of the department of birds at the American Museum of Natural History.

In an address to the Auckl an appeal for the continued pres

and Institute last night lie made nervation of bush and wild life.

After discussing what he termed the exploitation of natural resources throughout the world. Dr Murphy said he had seen the work of New Zealand scientists in Wellington and throughout the country in the conservation of wild life.

eludes animals which arc likewise enemies of their prey.” After referring to the problem of erosion and waterlablcs in the Dominion, Dr Murphy said New Zealand surely needed more forests established on the hilltops above the grasslands. He hoped an increasing number of them would be native forests.

He had seen the way in which they were tackling the Dominion’s problems and he hoped the Government and people would give them every support. “I am hoping exchanges can be made between workers of our American Fish and Wild Life Service in Washington and some of the young men and women engaged in the same kind ol' research in New Zealand,” JDi Murphy said. MUCH TO LEARN “I believe the New Zealanders would benefit from experience of some of our recent methods in larger terrains, and we would learn much from the new, formidable and thoroughly astonishing problems you nave to face here. When I return to Washington I intend to do what I can to introduce these exchange proposals.” Particular problems had been created in New Zealand by predatory animals that .vere aliens and that had never been intended for introduction to a land which had evolved without them.

At Waipoua ho had been pleased to learn that the plan of the officers in control was to plant kauri seedlings over 3000 additional acres. APPEALING SCHEME

lie was not prepared to enter a controversy as to what should be done in the conservation and spreading of the kauri but the scheme for new plantings had appealed to him. Trees like pohulukawa, rimu, tolara and kahikatea should all be preserved. It was shallow thinking to say that these trees must be cut because they were needed. Would the need be any less when they were all gone?

References to need often meant marketability—they must be cut because they could be sold.

He had also heard that there was agitation to remove the prohibition on the shooting of the shore or wading birds like godwils. His opinion was that these birds would never be game birds. They were’ not birds that reared great.' broods like ducks and grouse. They also made their long migrations in narrow lines—a target, perhaps, for the older black powder, muzzle-load-ing guns but none for modern weapons. If they were shot again they would not last three seasons. OUTDOOR LAND

There were, for instance, pigs, goals, alien door and Australian opossums, and it was possible that the opossums might ultimately prove the worst and hardest to eliminate. KILLING SIIAGS

"I understand that certain species of shags in New Zealand are marked for slaughter.” Dr Murphy stated. “I do not know enough about the shags here to criticise that policy, but I do know that in the United States and Canada investigations go to show that they eat more spawn-devouring fish, spider crabs and other characters that endanger the population and welfare of game and food fishes than they oat of the fish themselves. “We have also found that most animals cannot exist and increase happily without the existence of their natural predatory enemies. “Their target is the sick and the weak and in most cases their food in-

“New Zealand is primarily an outdoor land." Dr Murphy added. “You have charming cities but they cannot compete in colour, aesthetics or historical interest with the cities of Europe. “Your charm comes from the kauri, the rimu and the pohutukawa; from the kiwi, the lui and the kakn; from the ocean beaches and from the mountains. “They arc what distinguish New Zealand from the rest of the world.” GREEN VEGETABLES 2 Last MD .