CHAPTER XIII.
DISTRIBUTION.
From the dark gorge where burns the morning star,
I hear the glacier river rattling on
And sweeping o’er his ice-ploughed shingle-bar,
While wood-owls shout in sombre unison.
And fluttering southern dancers glide and go;
And black swans’ airy trumpets wildly, sweetly blow.
The area of the Kea’s distribution is continuous, but very limited. It is confined solely to the mountain country of the South Island of New Zealand, which extends for 400 miles in one direction and 80 miles in the other, making altogther an area of some 40,000 square miles.
Wherever there is mountainous country in the South Island, with the exception of the Kaikoura Mountains in the North East, the Kea can be found.
It was first discovered by Mr. W. Mantell in 1856 in the Murihuku district, which embraces practically all Southland. It was a rara avis, and some thought that it was confined to Southland. However, as soon as men pierced the mountain fastnesses that run up the west coast of the island, its distribution was found to be much wider. A few years after its discovery others were found, not only in Southland and Otago, but in Canterbury as far north as the Rangitata Gorge, about 200 miles north from where it was first seen. In 1859 Sir Julius von Haast saw it in the Mount Cook region, and a year later Sir W. Buller found it in the Rangitata Gorge.
As early as 1862 Sir James Hector noticed it in most of the snow mountains of Otago, during his Geological Survey of that province, and in the same year Sir Julius von Haast saw one on the Godley Glacier. In 1865 Sir Julius found it a long way above its supposed limit,—around Browning’s
