Page:The Kea, a New Zealand problem (1909).pdf/145

Rh after passing north through the Peel Forest and the Ashburton Gorge, the Kea had commenced to kill sheep around Mt. Torlesse. Since then it has slowly extended north to the stations in the Amuri District, and so badly affected were they that in 1906 a meeting of runholders was held in Culverden to try to abate the nuisance.

So far I have no records of sheep-killing in Marlborough and North Nelson, though the Keas are now found there.

In Westland also the Keas have spread, for in 1906 Mr. Condon, of Bruce Bay, South Westland, for the first time had some sheep killed by Keas.



The fact that no fossils of Keas have been found in the North Island of New Zealand seems to indicate that the birds never extended further than the South Island; but, while in the Museum, Christchurch, I unexpectedly came across two wing bones and a lower mandible of a Kea, obtained from the Chatham Islands. These interesting specimens were presented to the Museum by Mr. J. J. Fougere, of Te One, on the main island, and were identified by the late Capt. F. W. Hutton. These, with some more Keas’ bones and other sub-fossils, were found in some drifting sand-hills at Petre Bay, by Mr. Fougere, in 1897. In a letter he states: “I do