THE BALANCE OF NATURE

Taranaki Daily News, 3 August 1931, Page 2

THE BALANCE OF NATURE

SOME AMENDS NEEDED. . The balance of nature, a changing balance at the best, has been subjected to extraordinary disturbance in New Zealand by the entry of a new civilisation more addictedj writes the New Zealand Native Bird Protection Society, to cultivation than to culture. New Zealand is not unique in this. It is complained in other countries that civilisation has unduly tilted the balance against bird life “by destroying breeding places and food supplies of certain species in bringing land under cultivation, at the same time providing better breeding places and more abundant food for other species.” It is easy to see how the cycle of improvement in New Zealand has been against the native bush birds and favourable to imported birds. Much of the native bird life was unadapted to cultivation; yet the tui and, perhaps, the bell-bird are adaptable to garden life, especially if bird-feeding trees are grown. But when the pea rifle, cats and rats and weasels and stoats-are thrown into the balance against the native birds, their problem is serious. They need help. Give it thought in August (Bird Alon th), the time of the year when natural food is scarcest; then bird-feeding (at places out of reach of cats) may constitute some reparation for the deprevations civilisation has wrought.