PATER’S CHATS WITH THE BOYS.

Otago Witness, Issue 3673, 5 August 1924, Page 69

PATER’S CHATS WITH THE BOYS.

THE TUATARA AND WHAT IT TEACHES. *» When in the Museum one day I was observing the specimen tuatara in that institution, some small boys present were equally interested, and asked me many curious questions about it —many more than I was prepared to answer at the time. One asked whether it was a lizard. I told him that though it looked eo like one, it was not a lizard in the real sense of the word, though lizards and all other five-toed crawling creatures bad developed from a common ancestor that lived before the Jurassic period, millions of years ago. In the Jurassic period the ancestors of the tuatara attained an immense size, some being over 30ft in length, and must have been fearsome creatures to gaze upon, being armour-plated, and having huge plate-like spines upon their backs. They were really the typical dragons that little boys have read about in fables of fairy stories. What they fed upon in those long-past days of the world history is not exactly known, but it seems to be true in the history of the evolution of animals and the development of species that Eig fleas have other fleas upon their backs, that bite ’em; And these fleas have other fleas, and so on infinitum —which means they lived by swallowing whatever suitable and tasty animal victim they found themselves capable of catching and digesting. The remains of these huge reptiles or dragons have been found in Europe m the sandstone mountains of that continent. Scientific men having studied their skeletons and those of the Ne>w Zealand tuatara, have come to the conclusion that our so-called lizard is the living representative of those dragons of the aged past. The resemblance is so great that the tuatara may claim to oe the most aristocratic land creature in the world as far as being able to trace one's ancestors backward in time gives a claim to that gentlemanly distinction. Now as each main geological division of the earth’s is measured in time by twenties and thirties of millions of years, it must be hundreds of millions of years since the time when Mr Tuatara’s great forefathers were in their prime, as far as size in bone, muscle, and appetite are concerned in the act of living and getting a living. That being so, what of New Zealand, the only country in the world where, though degenerate in size, are the only living lineal dragon descendants in the world? The surface of tire world to-day is totally different from what it was in those times. The very mountain® in which! tthe reptilian fossil remains were found, the Jurassic Alps if France, for instance, were sandy beaches, plains, on the sandy bottom of a lake or shallow sea. Europe, Asia, Africa, and America as formed to-day on the surface of the globe were nonexistent, and many changes has the surface of this old earth undergone before thq geagrapljical 'arrangement of land and water became what it is to-day. Such changes are still going on, but in many ways in a much slower manner. In ages still to come, providing no cosmic (universe) accidents take place, thq wuujle surface erf the earth will be again changed. It is in studying the life history of the tuatara that w T e learn many striking and amazing facts concerning changes on the earth’s surface. The study tells us that New Zealand, or, rather, certain parts of it, must have escaped oceanic drowning or submergence. It is the top of an old continent that once occupied the space where now exists the South Pacific Ocean. Geologists tell us that the last continent that existed there was a large tract of land extending from near South America right across very nearly to Australia and the West Indian Islands. The now mysterious and famous Eiaster Island is also a remaining piece of the highlands of that ancient land. If all New Zealand had been submerged there would exist no living specimens of the old Jurassic or Triassic dragons as exemplified in the 'peculiar reptile named by the Maori tuatara. or ruatara. Parts of New Zealand as we see them to-day did not exist, even in the near geological past. The Canterbury Plains, the Wanganui Plain, ihe Southland Plains, and many other plains open to the sea are new plains—that is, of comparatively recent formation. It is, therefore, not peculiar that the tuatara is found in such isolated places as the Hen and Chickens Islands, Karimu, the Brothers and Stephens Islands. It is not only a strange picture of the geological past of the earth’s appearance that the study of the tuatara gives us. It also tells us something about birds which also appeared on earth about the Triassic times, and of which the fossil remains of two have been found, one of which was about the size of a pigeon, and the other a much larger and fearful looking creature, having leathery wings and long rows of cruel teeth—a veritable flying dragon. The examination of the skeleton of the tuatara tells us that its ancestors in some form or the other must have appeared earlier than the Triassic, for in its skeleton, in the arrangement of the bony protection of the heart and lungs, there is a similarity to the breast of a bird. From this formation the bird has developed its “ keel plate,” or peculiar breastbone. There is also the same arrangement for preventing the caving-in or distortion of the very light ribs which are necessary for living creatures. Also, if one notices carefully the mouth of the tuatara. the beak-like appearance is very plain. The point of the top jaw has the

bend that is seen at the point of the beak of a seagull and such birds as require a gripping point for pulling their food or prey to pieces. The beak of the tuatara is also of a horny nature, like that of a bird.

It is also peculiar that, when young, the tuatara has reptilian teeth, and that gradually these disappear or change into the horny ridges which form the biting apparatus of the adult. Of course, like other reptiles, it lays eggs, but it is remarkable that though the animal quickly forms in an egg it takes 13 or 14 months to hatch out. Though a slothful creature, which remains for hours at a time as motionless as a stone figure, it is a good fighter, and can, when the necessity demands, move its head and make a snap with 'lightning-like speed. As its food chiefly consists of grubs, worms, and insects, and it will not touch dead food unless it is moved to and fro, the necessity for quickness of motion can be understood. The same characteristic movement of the head and beak is seen in the action of birds. Like the crocodile, it lays its eggs in the sand, and leaves the natural temperature of the material to develop the embryo —that is, the seed of life within the egg. It watches its nest in exactly the same way as does the alligator. If necessary, it burrows to make its home and a nest for the young when hatched, but it prefers, as a rule, to share the burrow of the mutton bird, our very edible and palatable New Zealand petrel. hrom whax, is written here it can be seen that either birds have developed from the ancient (forerunners of the tuatara, or that both have had common ancestry in some long-bygone reptile.