LOCAL NATURAL HISTORY.

Otago Witness, Issue 1916, 10 August 1888, Page 14

LOCAL NATURAL HISTORY.

NOTES ON THE GEOLOGY AND EARLY HISTORY OF WAIHEMO, UPPER SHAG VALLEY. By a Green Vallet Settler. As the traveller arrives at Dunback, perchance on a day's'fishing, he cannot avoid noticing the terraces from the Shag river to the base of the hills, showing the ancient courses of the river. Thence passing up the valley to the Waihemo Hotel, at one time known as Luk's, and keeping by the old road up the Sandhills, the bed of an arm of the sea may be traced for three or four miles from near Shag Valley station up by the neighbouring Flat Hill on to near Coal creek. The trace of this old fiord is broken by the adjoining more inland hills, which have been formed by volcanic eruptions and upheavals. This Track of Calcareous Freestone or sandy rock abounds with the spoils of the sea, in the shape of numerous shells and other fossils, tho remains of a later period. With the gradual passing away of the age of universal ice, when the seal and the seahorse or walrus basked in the scant sunshine on tho ice-bound coast, the locality has slowly assumed its present appearance. On the Sandhills was found embedded in the sandstone a large portion of the tusk of a walrus, curved and flat on the inside. Numerous shells have also been found. Two very large and perfect oyster shells have been turned up by the plough 12in in circumference, and almost round. These are .interesting as setting forth tho progress of life on the globe. Some of the very best lands in the country, such as the farms near the Sandhills and th« land in the Government township of Waikouaiti and along the coast for miles, are situated on this calcareous freestone. Whether the rise of the old ocean bed was gradual or sudden — probably there was a slow and gradual rise on this coast while a depression was taking place on the west coast— evidences are observable all around Shag Valley, with its numerous picturesque conical peaks, of great disturbances, which subsequently left the volcanic rocks above the calcareous freestone, and these being formed of such hard material as basalt have been worn away very little through the long ages which have intervened. In some cases the formation suddenly changes to mica schist, which lies more inland, the soil and^subsoil being quite different. The soil on The Volcanic Formation is very good — a rich black loam on a marl pubsoil; still a large part of this land will remain only fit for pasturage, owiug to its rough and broken nature and the abundance of rocks in it. The soil originally formed here was probably deposited — as seen all around the Flat Hill, 2000 acres of the best part of the Green Valley settlement — in the form of showers of mud accompanied with showers of basaltic stone as in the recent eruptions in the North Island. The mud can still be traced on portions of this hill, forming terraces on tbe slopes. The mas« of mud in its liquid state had pushed the volcanic atones in front of it, as may be seen from the stones being principally on the face of the terraces. The terraces themselves are comparatively level and fit for cultivation. The land is very fertile, dry, and warm, the subsoil being composed of a mixture of generous olay and marl. Though expensive to work, it has plenty of lime in its, and is full of vegetable matter, differing in this respect from the Soil of ,the low hills up the Waikouaiti river, which are of volcanic order and' over which probably showers of ashes were spread from Mounts Watkin, which in ages past was an active volcano. To come down from primeval to modern times, near the old course of Coal creek, Waihemo, ■which has worn for itself quite recently a new deep channel on the other side of the road, there is a flat of about 10 acres which has been in olden times — the good old times of New Zealand — a favourite Camping Ground of the Maoris in their fishing and hunting expeditions, or perpaps on their way to the lakes. Here are to be seen on the surface of the gravel the remains of the fires where they cooked the gigantic birds which they had captured on the neigbouring Kakauui Range. Whether they had set fire to the bush on these hills for the purpose of capturing the moa or by accident there is no means of ascertaining ; the result however, is that there is here for a hundred miles" a country destitute of bush. In many of the gullies of the Kakanuis there s are' to be' found patches covered with charred logs. These the few early settlers and roadmakers were glad to utilise for fuel. The sites of these destructive fires, when first ploughed up, were, and still are, partly covered with the burnt bones of the moa. Not far from these are the more recent ovens of the natives, some 2ft to 3ft in depth and Bft in diameter ; but there are no burnt bones to be found near them. Close to the old bed of the creek numerous traces of cooking middens were found, and the plough exposed to view a number of stone axes and other implements lying together about sin below the surface. One these is only lin wide, and has a sharp rounded point, and was evidently used for carving ; another is large and more like an adze thnu a tomahawk. Ail are of a hard dark stone aud beautifully polished. All the.«e, with many more got afterwards, have for the hand a rough part admirably suited for its purpose. One implement unlike the rest was a thin piece of slate 4in wide, and ground to a fine edge. This might have been used for dressing flax. The plough is fast obliterating the middens and other traces of the old inhabitants, who might have left their stone tools there 200 or 300 years ago. In 4 A Cave on Deep Dell Run, not far from this camping ground, was found the model of a canoe of hard wood like kowhai, and well finished. From the fact of one part having a little spout we may conclude that it might have been used as a drinking vessel. This relic is in the possession of the manager of Deep Dell. When the district was. first settled 10 years ago, as the virgin soil was broken up many moa bones {were found, but seldom whole, the plough having broken them before they could be got at, being 4in or so below bhe surface. This district has furnished the Dunediu Museum with two of its finest specimens of moa skeletons. Heaps of as many little round stones as would fill a cup wero turned up by the plough and must have been iv the gizzard of the moas as they wandered about the bushy dells and ridges. What a change has the pakeha made since his advent into the country with his axe and plough and fire to clear che land and "subdue it." Where the moas and wekas wandered about with comparatively little molestation, bunny now multiplies and defies all attempts at his extermination ; the creeks and rivers which furnished the natives with eels are now stocked with trout, and the land which ihe Maoris cultivated'to little advantage, the white man is now causing tp yield •-• some thirty-fold some sixtyfold and some a hundred-fold," *

300 years ago. In