A Prison-Breaker.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20281, 16 April 1934, Page 6

A Prison-Breaker .

Nature Notes.

By

Jaims Drummond.

F.L.S.. F.Z.S.

gIR WALTER BULLER placed a kiwi at night in an unoccupied stable. In the darkness it forced aside a heavy packing case, removed a loose scantling stud, tunnelled a passage through hard clay, and escaped, taking a companion with it. Sir Walter Buffer kept in his aviary in Wellington six great spotted kiwis. He fed them with raw minced beef and ox heart. Three pined, wasted away to skeletons and died. At the end of a month all the others were fat and heavy. They were sent alive to Lord Rothschild, arriving at the Tring aviary, England, in excellent condition, and were added to the largest flock of captive kiwis ever kept in any part of the world. Before kiwis were protected, a collector caught thirty-three in the Heaphy Valley, West Coast. He kept a flock of six alive, intending to take them to Wellington. On shifting camp he carried them in canvas sacks with airholes. His son and he spent so much time digging earthworms for the captives that he closed the hunting expedition, but landed a collection of dead kiwis and live kiwis at Wellington. In those days an ordinary kiwi skin was bought by a dealer for £l, a live kiwi for £1 ss, a kiwi’s egg for £1 10s. Boys at Ross, South Westland, were paid 2s Gd for a skin and 5s for an egg.