PACIFIC FLIGHT

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXIII, 17 August 1940, Page 11

PACIFIC FLIGHT

What the Baby Mutton Bird Can Do j Probably tha most fascinating of all New Zealand birds is the Sooty Shearwater. or Mutton bird, which comes to I our shores once a year from the far northern regions. One egg only is laid by the mother bird and it is a marvellous fact that, due to the highly nutritious fish supplied by the parents, the baby bird soon weighs up to one and a half pounds more than either of them! When the young chick is three or four months old, it is given a final survey by its parents who then leave it alone in its nest and migrate across the Pacific. They stop off the coast of California to await the coming of the young bird. With no mother or father to feed him. Master Sooty Shearwater soon loses his surplus fat and about two weeks later he begins to waddle about, testing his wings and legs. He learns to tak? short fishing excursions and when quite sure of himself, heads northward on' the trail of his parents. After the meeting off California, the ; family heads towards Arctic regions. i Man has all the marvels of science! to help him circumnavigate the globe, but these sturdy little fellows follow an unerring track across the Pacific without any such aid. Men call it the homing instinct. It would be better known as the guiding hand of God. —Blue Peter.