Campbell. He would not credit me, and all hands on the station refused to believe that the birds would do it; so I was ordered to go to another hill, called the Black Hill, and Mr. Campbell came with me, and some more men, and at the first mob we came to Mr. Campbell and the rest saw the Keas at work.”
It seems to me to be a great pity that the early writers on this question did not take the trouble to get authenticated evidence; for, if this had been done, much of the confusion and uncertainty as to the Kea’s real habits would have been prevented.
However, instead of obtaining the above evidence from Mr. McDonald, which would, at least, have recorded the names of two men who had actually seen the Kea killing sheep, most early writers make use of an indefinite extract which appeared in the “Otago Daily Times,” an extract which, though correct in itself, was not at all conclusive. It runs as follows:—
“For the last three years the sheep belonging to a settler, Mr Henry Campbell, in the Wanaka district (Otago), appeared affected with what was thought to be a new kind of disease; neighbours and shepherds were equally unable to account for it, not having seen anything of the kind before. The first appearance of this supposed disease is a patch of raw flesh on the loin of the sheep, about the size of a man’s hand; from this, matter continually runs down the side, taking the wool completely off the part it touches; and in many cases death is the result. At last a shepherd noticed one of the mountain parrots sticking to a sheep, picking at the sore, and the animal seemed unable to get rid of its tormentor. The runholder gave directions to keep watch on the parrots when mustering on the high ground; the result has been that, during the present season, when mustering high up on the ranges near the sky-line, they saw several of the birds surrounding a sheep, which was freshly bleeding from a small wound over the loin; on other sheep were noticed places where the Kea had begun to attack them, small pieces of wool having been picked out.”
