NEW ZEALAND BIRDS

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume 76, 14 October 1941, Page 6

NEW ZEALAND BIRDS

KEEN INTEREST OF WORLD’S SCIENTISTS Distinguished scientists in Great Brij tain and America have declared that New Zealanders have a duty to the ; whole world in saving certain birds ! from extinction. Some good comment on that subject was given by H. Bar- ! raclough Fell in the English magazine ; “Nature.” “New Zealand has provided biological science with the classical and most striking case of the effects 'upon a fauna of prolonged isolation.’* ihe wrote. “For an immense period of ■ time it has remained a sanctuary for archaic types. The facts about the ' kiwis, ground-parrots, wekas and other I flightless birds are quoted in perhaps : every zoological course in the univeri sities of the world. Yet, these very j animals so important to science are I now in the gravest danger of becoming extinct like the giant eagles and moas i before them. The aid of zoologists in j Britain and elsewhere is urgently need, j ed to support the efforts being made I by New Zealand workers to bring about ! ieforms to save these animals, which, once lost, will never be known again. It is insufficient to have passed laws purporting to ’protect’ them, when inadequate wild-life administration is available to enforce the laws. Active measures must be taken as soon as possible to destroy the complex of introduced pests which have ousted, or actually attacked, the defenceless native species. The problem is of the utmost importance. and we owe it to future generations. and especially to future biologists. not only in New Zealand, but also throughout the rest of the world, to solve it now.” Petroleum was better known thousands of years ago than in mid-Victor-ian days. The men who built the walls of Babylon ami Nineveh made their mortar from it; Herodotus saw pitch drawn from a lake in Zacynthus 500 years before Christ was cradled; the holy fires of Baku, worshipped countless centuries ago. were nothing but blazing oil: and the North American Indians were drawing it from the earth before the first Norman soldier was