NATURE-AND MAN

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 79, Issue 277, 23 November 1936, Page 2

NATURE-AND MAN

Romance of a Rewa-Rewa A HOME FOR BIRDS (Edited by Leo Fanning.) Nearly 20 years ago I gathered some leaf mould in a friend’s patch of bush. Carefully, I placed the rich soil in a box, kept it damp in a warm place and eagerly awaited developments. Among seedlings of native trees which rose from that little bed was a rewarewa (known as “Native honeysuckle”) which is now a handsome aristocrat nearly 20ft. high, growing strongly and snugly beside a kowhai, which has also another native companion, a splendid tree-fern. Well, that is the beginning of the romance. I mentioned recently the blackbirds which reared a family in a self-sown plum-tree beside a path at the front of my house in Kelburn. A few days ago I saw the parents tugging again at the “green feathers” of my tree-fern very early in the morning and darting into the rewa-rewa, which is only a few feet away from the front gate. Yes, in a wellscreened fork, they have made a nest which would not be noticeable unless one knew it was there. Previously these birds did not seem to be seriously concerned about concealment of their home, but they have been much more careful this time. They could hardly be better protected*against rain than they are in the rewa-rewa, whose long strong leaves, thickly clustered, make a good roof. | It was amusing from behind the curtain of a window, to watch the birds striving with the tough fern. Once, when Mr. Blackbird put in a specially strong pull, the piece came away suddenly, and he did a somersault. But up he came again on the frond, feeling rather proud of himself, with his plunder firmly held in his beak. How warily he peered about before he flew into the rewa-rewa! Comedy of a Cat and Pigeons. Many of Wellington's tame pigeons have their homes in various niches of Parliament Buildings where they were cooing while legislators were billing in the spring-time. A favourite feeding place of some of the birds is on the smooth green sward by the old museum. The other afternoon when I was passing by that place, I noticed a black cat hungrily crouched on a slope just below the green fiat where about 20 pigeons were strutting and pecking. Stealthily puss crept on, and made a sudden spring which was harmless, of course. The birds did not bother to fly away. They merely flutitered up a foot or two, and settled quite close to the cat, at which they 'glanced with indignation and scorn. “Drat that cat. When will it learn sense and good manners?” they seemed to be saying. I deduced that I the cat had made many similar futile stal kings, which had always ended in

|a catch of nothing better than ridicule. The animal looked as if it would like the earth to swallow it when observers of the comedy laughed. Yet next day it probably again hopped out on hope of better luck. j An Irrepressible Hedge-Sparrow. It. was 6.20 in the evening, at a bend of the main motor highway from Wellington to Kelburn and Karori. The sky was dreary and a cold wind was blowing, but these things did not chill the blithe spirit of Mr. Hedgesparrow perched on an electric-cur-rent wire, singing a song of love to his imate, safely sitting on a nest in a bushy bank close by. A roaring tide of cars, whose drivers had tarried at clubs and “pubs,” flowed by, but Mr. Hedge-sparrow was not perturbed. [The more noise they made, the more [effort he put into his trill. He seemed Ito regard the footers and hooters as challengers. Two years ago a pair of hedge-sparrows nested in a big white broom in the middle of my garden. They are birds as useful as they arclovable. They are as dainty in their I ways as grey-warblers. Spread of Beauty. ' Al last some citizens of Wellington 'arc following the good example of folk in other cities and towns of New Zealand in growing flowers outside their ‘front fences. Of course, not many [footpaths in Wellington are suitable I for that purpose, but there is some [Scope—mainly on banks—for the cult ’of beauty to gladden the passer-by. There is a special charm in this kind of public-spirited gardening. 1 always raise my hat when I pass a house I whose residents have t hat pleasant atItitude to the community. I’ps and Downs of the Common Sparrow. I Some comments of H. GuthrieSmith in the second edition of Tutira, published in 1926: I “Nowadays I find the winter numbers of the sparrow depend on the changing necessities of station management, on the amount of oats (grown, and on the number of contract .plough-camps, where teams are fed, where there is always grain spilt from nose-bags or unfinished in feedingt roughs. Probably a chart would 'show pretty accurately the relation of the sparrow population to the price of wool in London; with prices good more ploughing is done, more horsefeed grown; with prices bad, less. Like his fellow-mortals in New Zealand, the species is affected by events taking place at the other end of the world—events which he cannot control and for which he is in no degree responsible. j The sparrow, however, by no means 'has everything his own way on Tutira. 'Although indigenous to Britain, heavy rain does not suit him; no creature, indeed, can look more woe-begone [than a wet sparrow, with unpreened, unoiled, and draggled plumage. Our local birds are from time to time decimated, I may almost say annihilated, by the great storms of three or four days’ duration which, at intervals, passed over the run. During one such gale, registering just under a foot and a-half of rain in three sequent days, nearly every sparrow on the station perished; that any at all survived was owing to the ingenuity and adaptability of the race. On the afternoon of the third day of rain, a considerable number not only took refuge in the fowl-house, but actually ensconsed

themselves amongst the feathers of the great silly Buff Orpingtons, broody on their nests or occupied in laying eggs. UNTO THE HILLS. 1 will turn my feet to the hills where green woods grow, For the years fly fast, Bearing my youth away; but the winds still blow In the woods, as in days long past. I will turn my feet to the woods, where sweet, birds sing Their ageless song; And Time will pause on his shining silver wing, And the golden days grow long. I will turn my feet to the hills, where cool streams flow; 1 v. iij rest and dream, While the radiant hopes and visions of long ago Glide by on the silent stream. I will turn my feet to the woods, for shadows fall And youth flies fast; And there, where cool streams flow and swift birds call, I shall find peace at last. JEAN H. MATHER, in the New Zealand Railways Magazine.