CHAPTER I.
INTRODUCTION.
In a land which depends to a very large extent on agricultural and pastoral pursuits and industries some knowledge of the animal and vegetable life of the country should be taught in every school, and the love of Nature in all her varied aspects should be inculcated in every child. The best way of acquiring such knowledge is by observation, and every child is more or less a naturalist from the start. It has been said that man is a classificatory animal, and it is wonderful how most children begin to collect such objects as interest them, and how, unconsciously, they begin to classify them.
But, hand-in-hand with observational work, a certain amount of instruction is very helpful, and if the one can work in harmoniously with the other progress in the knowledge of Nature is greatly facilitated. Books conveying instruction in botany are common enough, but those dealing with the rudiments of zoological work in a form sufficiently attractive to the uninformed reader are by no means numerous. I do not know of any work dealing with the animals which are frequently met with in New Zealand, and in the hope of partly supplying this want I propose to write a few sketches of the wild life of the country, in which I shall attempt to give some account of those which are most common. The late Professor Hutton and Mr. James Drummond, of Christchurch, published some years ago a valuable work entitled “Animals of New Zealand,” which should be in every school library. This, besides being rather expensive for most private readers, is a more or less technical work, and deals only with the higher vertebrate fauna indigenous to these Islands. Excellent little articles appear from time to time in the School Journal, but these are not readily procurable.
In all centres of settlement the animal life is almost as much due to foreign immigration as the people are; but observers cannot tell this fact without some assistance, and one of the difficulties with which all embryo naturalists are met is to know which plants and animals are native and which are introduced. Let me illustrate this.
Living as I do in a suburb of Dunedin, just outside the Town Belt, I observe in my walks that in this neighbourhood certain species of birds are very common. They are house-sparrows, blackbirds, thrushes, starlings, and hedge-sparrows. These are all forms which have been introduced from Great Britain. Almost as abundant, but more erratic in their occurrence, are wax-eyes (or twinkies) and goldfinches—the former a somewhat recent immigrant, apparently from Australia, and the latter introduced from Britain. Less abundant in varying degree are grey warblers, tomtits, fan-tailed flycatchers, chaffinches, greenfinches, an occasional yellowhammer, and a little brown owl. The first three are natives, the rest are introduced. The native bell-bird (or korimako) visits the gardens from time to time, especially when the trees are in flower; while occasionally in the outlying districts one hears or sees a tui or a morepork: these are all natives. In the more open country introduced skylarks are common, as are the native ground-larks, or pipits. On the seashore are numerous species of birds, but these are all indigenous species. On still nights one often hears the black swans flying overhead in their migrations from one sheet of water to another: these were introduced from Western Australia.
About the house are occasionally a few mice, and in town brown rats are common. These are not kept in check by the dogs and cats which are common in many houses. During the nights hedgehogs roam about the gardens, and are far more common than unobservant people have any notion of. All these and the other mammals met with, such as horses and cattle, sheep, goats, pigs, and rabbits, were originally introduced, mostly from Britain.
When I go to work in the garden I turn up numerous earthworms, nearly all belonging to introduced species—unless I start to trench in new ground, when I come on native species. The wood-lice are introduced; so are the earwigs, which are so common in the north end of Dunedin; so are all the slugs and snails. The bees and humble-bees are introduced, as are the large drone-flies which visit so many of our flowers in autumn and early winter. Nearly all the plants in our fields, orchards, and gardens, cultivated ones and weeds alike, are of foreign origin; so are the aphides and scale insects which infest them. The flies which infest our houses and carry dirt and disease in all directions are foreigners; so are the borers which destroy our houses and furniture; and so also are bugs, fleas, and lice, which are harboured in dirty surroundings.
The question might well be asked, Where do the native species come in? The answer would have to be that wherever man goes certain species of animals and plants follow him, and become established if the conditions are suitable; while another section he either takes with him for their utility or introduces afterwards for various reasons; and the native species gradually get pushed out.