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Human agency and exotic birds in New Zealand Paul Star Independent scholar 246 Harington Point Road RD2, Dunedin 9077, New Zealand Email: starmulq@gmail.com January 2013 Abstract The subject of biological invasion is now accepted as a major theme in environmental history. This paper analyses the role of human agency in the deliberately managed invasion of British birds to New Zealand in the late nineteenth century, and finds both historical and ecological relevance in the available data. Evidence concerning these introductions, largely undertaken by acclimatisation societies, has already played a significant role in the development of biological invasion theory. Analysis of some of the data has been used by ecologists to confirm the importance of propagule pressure (introduction effort) in successful introduction. This paper exploits the recently increased accessibility of historic newspaper references to acclimatisation in New Zealand, and stresses their importance. Firstly, they show the limits of the database used until now by ecologists when analysing the introductions. Secondly, a close case study sheds new light on the full potential for human agency with regard to introduction effort. The historic role of skilled individuals in perfecting and passing on management techniques, increasing acclimatisation success, is explored. Attention is also given to secondary, and even tertiary, releases of exotic birds from locally-established populations within New Zealand, accelerating the rate of spread. This indicates more active, multi-layered human involvement than that identified by ecologists in their numerical analyses. Finally, it is suggested that examination of historic New Zealand avian introductions may have relevance for present-day conservation biology, given the parallel between small exotic populations seeking to establish in a new location, and small populations of endangered native species trying to avoid extinction. By 1900 there may already have been a transfer of technical expertise, gained from acclimatising exotics, to the newer task of conserving the indigenous. Keywords Biological invasion, bird introduction, human agency, acclimatisation, New Zealand. Introduction Since The Ecology of Invasions by Animals and Plants by Charles Elton was published in 1958, the study of biological invasions has been popular among ecologists and other life scientists. Once the American historian Alfred Crosby, in 1986, conceived of an ‘ecological imperialism’ underlying the expansion of the Europe’s flora and fauna into non-European environments in colonial times, the

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subject also gained increasing attention from humanist scholars.1 In 2010 the re-publication, in book form, of representative ‘bioinvader’ articles from the journal Environment and History was one indication of the acceptance of this subject as a major theme in environmental history.2 An earlier collection of articles, published as a special issue of Landscape Research in 2003, set the pattern for how most historians have approached the subject since then. Introducing the volume, Marcus Hall said it concerned ‘how one can distinguish between natives and exotics, what this distinction suggests about human societies, and how humans have altered and been altered by these two classes of organisms’.3 His co-editor, Peter Coates, exemplified this approach in his influential book, published three years later, on ‘American perceptions of immigrant and invasive species’.4 Pursuing such matters in a British context, Chris Smout observed in 2003 that until the mid-twentieth century the concern was not with whether species were native or ‘alien’, but rather with whether they were vermin of either origin.5 These issues were again visited, by Coates, Smout and others, in a 2011 collection on ‘invasive and introduced plants and animals’ edited by historians Ian Rotherham and Rob Lambert.6 British environmental historians have been much exercised about the uncertain boundary between exotic and native species. This is a less contentious issue in New Zealand where, given the remoteness and insularity of the country, the lack of any human presence until about AD 1300, and the absence of any landing by Europeans until 1769, it is in most cases clear which animal and plant species are to be considered indigenous (already here before 1300), which exotics might usefully be termed ‘archeophytes’ (introduced with Polynesian humans before 1769), and which exotics are ‘neophytes’ (introduced after 1769). But while in New Zealand, ‘one can distinguish between natives and exotics’, it is this very marked polarity, together with the lateness, speed and extent of the exotic influx, that makes this country’s history such an instructive example of human-induced change.7 The present paper analyses the role of human agency in a deliberately managed biological invasion: the introduction of the European skylark (Alauda arvensis) and                                                                                                                1 Charles S Elton, The Ecology of Invasions by Animals and Plants, Methuen, London, 1956; Alfred W Crosby, Ecological Imperialism: The Biological Expansion of Europe, 900-1900, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1986. Canadian geographer Andrew Hill Clark’s The Invasion of New Zealand by People, Plants and Animals: The South Island was published by Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick in 1949. Crosby followed Clark in making New Zealand’s environmental history one of his main case studies of biological (that is, floral and faunal) invasion. 2 Sarah Johnson (comp), Bioinvaders: Themes in Environmental History, White Horse Press, Cambridge, 2010. 3 Marcus Hall, ‘The native, naturalised and exotic: Plants and animals in human history’, Landscape Research, Vol 28 No 1 (2003), pp 5–9. 4 Peter Coates, American Perceptions of Immigrant and Invasive Species: Strangers on the Land, University of California Press, Berkeley, 2006. 5 T Chris Smout, ‘The alien species in 20th-century Britain: Constructing a new vermin’, Landscape Research, Vol 28, No 1 (2003), pp 11–20. 6 Ian D Rotherham and Robert A Lambert (eds), Invasive and Introduced Plants and Animals: Human Perceptions, Attitudes and Approaches to Management, Earthscan, London and Washington DC, 2011.  7 See Paul Star, ‘Humans and the environment in New Zealand, c 1800 to 2000’, pp 47-70 in Giselle Byrnes (ed), The New Oxford History of New Zealand, Oxford University Press, South Melbourne, 2009. For renderings of the botanical terms ‘archaeophyte’ and ‘neophyte’ in the British context, see Chris Smout. ‘How the concept of alien species emerged and developed in 20th-century Britain’, pp 56-66 in Rotherham and Lambert, Invasive and Introduced Plants and Animals.

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blackbird (Turdus merula) to New Zealand in the late nineteenth century. It looks for both historical and ecological relevance in the available data, in the belief that this provides something new towards the wider debate on introduced plants and animals. This may have pertinence not only to environmental history, but also to conservation biology and wildlife rescue in the present. Introducing her work on the prickly pear in Madagascar, anthropologist Karen Middleton observes that ‘the historical case study has become an important tool in developing understandings of biological invasions and biological control’.8 In an earlier review of the literature on ‘plant transfers in historical perspective’, she and the Oxford environmental historian William Beinart called for ‘a combination of insights and research from sciences, social sciences and humanities’ and suggested that ‘a broader range of human agency needs to be considered’.9 What follows is a contribution along these lines, though it is primarily concerned with birds rather than plants. Avian invasions and acclimatisation records Evidence concerning exotic birds introduced to New Zealand has played a significant role in the development of biological invasion theory. Exotic bird species are defined as those ‘that are not naturally present in the wild bird assemblage inhabiting a location, but have moved beyond the limits of their normal geographic ranges by human actions (deliberate or accidental)’.10 It was in New Zealand, above all, that the organised introduction of such birds (and of other fauna, especially exotic fish and deer) was practised by ‘acclimatisation societies’, and was most persistent. According to British historian Christopher Lever, more than half of the world’s acclimatisation societies were in New Zealand. The first of the country’s societies was founded in Auckland in about 1861; many functioned continuously until the government reconstituted all such societies as ‘fish and game councils’ in 1990.12 The acclimatisation societies that survived into the twentieth century were almost exclusively concerned with the introduction and conservation of exotic fish, deer and game birds, primarily for their hunting and sporting value.13 The intention, however,                                                                                                                8 Karen Middleton, ‘Renarrating a biological invasion: Historical memory, local communities and ecologists’, Environment and History Vol 18 (2012), pp 61-95. Footnotes 3-7 of this article provide a selective bibliography of the international literature on biological invasions. 9 William Beinart and Karen Middleton, ‘Plant transfers in historical perspective: A review article’, Environment and History Vol 10 (2004), pp 3-29. This is also included in Sarah Johnson (comp), Bioinvaders: Themes in Environmental History, White Horse Press, Cambridge, 2010. 10 Tim M Blackburn, Julie L Lockwood and Phillip Cassey, Avian Invasions: The Ecology and Evolution of Exotic Birds, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2009, p 2. 12 Christopher Lever, They Dined on Eland: The Story of the Acclimatisation Societies, Quiller Press, London, 1992, provides a global overview, while between them Michael A Osborne, Nature, the Exotic, and the Science of French Colonialism, Indiana University Press, Bloomington, 1994, and (in less detail) Thomas R Dunlap, Nature and the English Diaspora: Environment and History in the United States, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1999, describe the French and British imperial acclimatisation movements. For more detailed New Zealand information, see R M McDowall, Gamekeepers for the Nation: The Story of New Zealand’s Acclimatisation Societies, 1861-1990, Canterbury University Press, Christchurch, 1990, pp 14, 18-23, 459-463. 13 McDowall, Gamekeepers for the Nation, pp 216-292, details the introduction of exotic fish species to New Zealand. Guil Figgins and Peter Holland, ‘Red deer in New Zealand: Game animal, economic resource or environmental pest?’, New Zealand Geographer Vol 68 (2012) pp 36–48, analyses the interrelationship between fluctuating human perceptions and the population of one exotic deer species.

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of the acclimatisation society founded in London in 1860, had been to increase the global range of ‘all innoxious animals, birds, fishes, insects, and vegetables, whether useful or ornamental’.14 The activities in the 1860s and 1870s of the New Zealand societies, whose members were mostly British born, continued to reflect this broader purpose, but with sentimental attachment to British species providing further motivation. The smaller birds introduced from Britain were not game species, but were expected to serve a function as insectivores that would reduce damage to grain crops. In addition, the ‘praiseworthy exertions’ of these societies would help to create ‘a true Britain of the South, by stocking the woods and forests of New Zealand with the feathered songsters of the old land’.15  Ecologists worldwide have already found that New Zealand acclimatisation society records constitute ‘a valuable resource for understanding the invasion process’.16 These have been used most notably by the ecologist Richard Duncan of Lincoln University (in Canterbury, New Zealand), in analysing the introduction and establishment of small birds (especially passerines or ‘sparrow-like’ birds) into New Zealand in the second half of the nineteenth century.17 Duncan’s research has been influential in demonstrating the crucial role of ‘propagule pressure’ in successful introduction. Propagule pressure, also termed ‘introduction effort’, is a measure of the number of individuals contributing to an ‘introduction event’. Exactly how propagule pressure affects introduction and establishment success is obscure, but it relates to ‘the problems of survival that face small populations of any organism’.18 In their review of the literature on avian invasions, British zoologist Tim Blackburn and his co-authors utilise the concept of the ‘invasion pathway’ in describing the stages by which a bird native to one place might become established in another place that is far from it (see Figure 1). Using evidence from Duncan and others, they confirm that propagule pressure is a key factor in determining the success or failure in both the transportation and introduction stages. They maintain, further, that only after gaining a fuller understanding of the factors affecting the introduction process can the importance of ‘species traits’ and ‘location’ (that is, of biological and environmental factors) be assessed for those species that, once successfully introduced, move on to being established or naturalised.

                                                                                                               14 First Annual Report of the Society for the Acclimatisation of Animals, Birds, Fishes, Insects and Vegetables within the United Kingdom, London, 1861, p 4. 15 Otago Witness 11 March 1871.  16 Blackburn et al, Avian Invasions, p 7. 17 Richard P Duncan, ‘The role of competition and introduction effort in the success of passeriform birds introduced to New Zealand’, The American Naturalist Vol 149 No 5 (May 1997), pp 903-915; R P Duncan, T M Blackburn and P Cassey, ‘Factors affecting the release, establishment and spread of introduced birds in New Zealand’, pp 137-154 in R B Allen and W G Lee (eds), Biological Invasions in New Zealand, Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg and New York, 2006. 18 Blackburn et al, Avian Invasions, pp 24, 57-67.  

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Native  species

Transported  species

Introduced  species

Established  or  naturalised  species

Invasive  speciesand  sometimes  pest

Transported  outside  native  range?(transport)

Not  considered  in  invasion  studies

Cage  bird,  pet  or  captive  species

Unsuccessful  introduction

Released  or  escapes?  (introduction)

Succeeds  in  establishinga  viable  population?(establishment)

Spreads  beyondrelease  area?(spread)

Fig 1: Schematic presentation of the invasion pathway (after Blackburn et al, Avian Invasions, p 11)

This means that the information used to determine and confirm the importance of propagule pressure must be as complete as possible, since the misanalysis of past events may result in the wrongful acceptance of a hypothesis as a law. Scientists who are meticulous in the recording and analysis of the results of their own experiments need to be equally critical and careful in their approach to historical data. Duncan and his fellow-ecologists, when analysing New Zealand’s early acclimatisation record, have tended to rely heavily on a 1922 volume describing ‘the naturalisation of animals and plants in New Zealand’.19 This was unquestionably a very valuable pioneering study, by a New Zealand scientist (G M Thomson) active in the acclimatisation movement. But is Thomson’s data comprehensive enough to act as the foundation stone for so much modern scientific and statistical analysis?20

                                                                                                               19 G M Thomson, The Naturalisation of Animals and Plants in New Zealand, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1922. Duncan does list six supplementary published sources which contributed to his 1997 results (p 905), raised to nine for his 2006 results (p 139), but there is no indication that he examined acclimatisation archives directly. 20 G M Thomson’s data was the primary source for analyses in J L Long in Introduced Birds of the World, David and Charles, Newton Abbot, 1981; in Clare J Veltman, Sean Nee and Mick J Crawley, ‘Correlates of introduction success in exotic New Zealand birds’, The American Naturalist Vol 147 No 4 (Apr 1996) pp 542-557; and by Duncan in 1997; it was revisited in Phillip Cassey, ‘Determining variation in the success of New Zealand land birds’, Global Ecology and Biogeography Vol 10 (2001), pp 161-172. Thomson’s data was also an important indirect source for conclusions reached in, for instance, R E Green, ‘The influence of numbers released on the outcome of attempts to introduce exotic bird species to New Zealand’, Journal of Animal Ecology Vol 66 No 1 (Jan 1997) pp 25-35 (using Long’s data); Gabriele Sorci, Anders Pape Moller and Jean Clobert, ‘Plumage dichromatism of birds predicts introduction success in New Zealand’, Journal of Animal Ecology, Vol 67 (1998), pp

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My research, based for the most part upon scrutiny of New Zealand newspaper references from 1855 to 1885, suggests that it is not. The evidence I have uncovered has always been available, but has only become amenable to comprehensive study with the recent digitisation of many New Zealand newspapers. While varying in detail and reliability, and needing to be treated with caution, newspaper references provide the widest record. Newspapers were often, in fact, the primary source for information contained in the secondary sources (published in the twentieth century) utilised by Duncan and others. Furthermore, many of the newspaper references are acclimatisation society meeting reports, directly matching those in the unpublished society minutes accessed by Thomson. Some others are mere snippets about small private introductions, but they often provide information not found elsewhere. The highest tally of introductions would be gained by integrating all known newspaper references with all records used by Duncan. The principal aim of the present paragraphs, however, is to indicate how different approaches yield different figures, and with this in mind I have kept the two sets of information separate. I have focussed on references to two representative exotic birds, the blackbird and skylark, which were deliberately and successfully introduced from Britain to New Zealand during this period. Both were species which reminded British settlers of ‘Home’, and also which ate weed seeds or else grubs and insect pests affecting agricultural productivity.21

As with forty other introduced passerine species, Duncan noted down the specific details of blackbird and skylark introductions that he found in Thomson’s study and in a few other published articles and books. These he tabulated in four groups, for introductions into the Auckland, Wellington, Canterbury and Otago ‘acclimatisation districts’. From Duncan’s published results it is not always clear what he regards as the boundaries of these districts, which changed over time, though at least in the case of the house sparrow (Passer domesticus) he included Wanganui in his Wellington total. Furthermore, he does not indicate whether all the releases he included in his totals were of birds captured outside New Zealand; I suspect some of these releases were of birds captured within the country but in another district. As closely as possible, I have analysed my newspaper references in the same manner as Duncan for the sake of comparison (see Table 1). Given the uncertainty about Duncan’s boundaries, I have kept international and interprovincial totals separate, and have listed figures for the smaller provinces separately.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              263-269 (using Veltman et al’s data); and Stephane Legendre, Jean Clobert, Anders P Moller and Gabriele Sorci, ‘Demographic stochasticity and social mating system in the process of extinction of small passerines: The case of passerines introduced to New Zealand’, The American Naturalist Vol 153 No 5 (May 1999) pp 449-463 (using Duncan’s data); and Daniel Sol and Louis Lefebvre, ‘Behavioural flexibility predicts invasion success in birds introduced to New Zealand’, Oikos Vol 90 No 3 (Sep 2000) pp 599-605 (using data from both Green and Veltman et al). 21 It soon became all too evident, however, that skylarks also ate grain crops and blackbirds liked fruit. Both species proceeded rapidly along the invasion pathway to reach its end-point, at which they were denounced as invasive pests. James Drummond wrote in 1906 that at first ‘The song of the skylark was listened to with a delight that can hardly be expressed in words … [but it] would soon be ranked as a feathered pest, second to none but the sparrow’, while ‘The blackbird was another treasured reminder of the Old Country; and it is now another “feathered friend” that is heartily cursed up hill and down dale’. Page 232 in James Drummond, ‘On introduced birds’, Transactions of the New Zealand Institute, Vol 39 (1906), pp 227-252.

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Table 1: Introductions of blackbirds and skylarks to New Zealand District/Province Date of introduction Number of releases Number of birds Duncan/Star Duncan/Star Duncan/Star Blackbird (Turdus merula) Auckland ……………1865 1862 4 6 170 189 Tauranga 1882 1 2 Hawkes Bay 1865 3 +2* 81 +9* Wanganui 1869 1 8 Wairarapa 1873 1 8 Wellington…………. - 1869 - 2 +1* - 36 +52* Nelson 1863 5 47 Canterbury…………. 1861 1864 7 9 477 484 Otago……………….. 1865 1865 5 6 138 152 Skylark (Alauda arvensis) Auckland……………1867 1862 2 4 +2* 62 62 +32* Hawkes Bay 1873 2 25 Wellington…………..1874 1871* 2 0 +2* 108 0 +23* Nelson 1863 2 25 Canterbury…………..1863 1863 5 6 +5* 434 46 +284* Otago………………..1867 1867 3 6 +4* 100 162 +200* Star (2012) differentiates international and *interprovincial introductions Sources: Appendix to Duncan (1997); and, for Star’s 2012 data, see Appendix to the present article: Tables 4, 5 and 6.

My results are often different from those obtained by Duncan. We have differences of up to five years in the first recorded dates of introduction (almost all in the1860s), while the figures for numbers of introductions and for the total numbers of birds introduced show wide disparity. In some cases Duncan accessed information that I have not found in newspaper sources, but mostly my figures are higher than his, and overall it is clear that I have accessed a larger pool of information than he did.22 Supplementary data of this kind, gathered cumulatively, indicates a greater number of introductions, sometimes over a more extended period, and higher totals for birds released. It will at least better substantiate conclusions ecologists have already reached about the operation or extent of propagule pressure, and it might also modify these conclusions. As will become clear, a careful differentiation between international and interprovincial introductions, which Duncan’s study did not attempt, alters the picture presented by the figures and suggests how propagule pressure may have been rendered more effective. More than just a revision of the figures, what is most required is a wider approach to the study of biological invasions in general. Greater attention to the details of species introduction would be a step in the right direction. At present a disproportionate 90

                                                                                                               22 The footnotes to appendix 5 suggest why Duncan has notably higher figures for the number of skylarks introduced into Wellington and Canterbury.

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per cent of peer-reviewed publications in this field deal rather with the establishment stage, further along the invasion pathway. Blackburn et al remark that ‘the study of patterns in transport and introduction is difficult to handle empirically, is nearly impossible to explore experimentally, and involves limited numbers of ecological interactions. In other words, the study of early invasion stages is ecologically boring and nearly impossible to obtain funds to explore from basic scientific initiatives that value experimental scientific approaches’.23 But while these early stages produce information that is difficult to render as data for scientific analysis, for environmental historians this is the most interesting material and the best source of narrative, since it includes and describes the greatest degree of direct human involvement. If we accept that ‘a large portion of the variance in which species establish, and where they establish, can be explained by patterns in transport and introduction’, any failure of invasion biologists to fully research these stages would be short-sighted. What little study they have received shows that these patterns reflect ‘human-induced changes in the location and rate of immigration’ and therefore points to ‘the guiding hand of humanity in the invasion process’.24 The introduction of skylarks and blackbirds into New Zealand suggests both the extent of this guidance and the role of management technique. The guiding hand of Richard Bills There was a changing approach to avian introduction in New Zealand during the 1860s and 1870s. This involved, firstly, a shift in the 1860s New Zealand from small private shipments (many more, I suspect, than is indicated by the occasional, often vague, reference) to large shipments commissioned by government-supported acclimatisation societies (better and more usually recorded, and more ‘professional’). Secondly, there was a shift in the techniques employed by the societies, both in how they brought birds into New Zealand and in what they did with them. Early attempts by acclimatisation societies to import English birds en masse were hit-or-miss affairs which often ended in heavy loss. For instance, of 112 birds that left England for the Auckland Acclimatisation Society on the Alice in 1863 only 11 survived, including one skylark.25 Of the 354 birds for the Nelson Acclimatisation Society on the Violet in the following year all 24 skylarks died, and in total only 29 birds survived.26 Experimenting with a less risky approach, Canterbury Acclimatisation Society offered £2 a pair for any English songbirds successfully brought across by emigrants from Britain,27 but the solution lay rather with increasing the number of survivors by ordering even larger quantities. At the same time the percentage that survived was increased by employing professional bird catchers, rather than crew members or emigrants, to take care of the birds during their passage. In this respect the Otago Acclimatisation Society were pioneers in employing the best people available. In 1867 their English contacts approached Manning Thatcher of Brighton, who had already been successfully employed by the Victorian                                                                                                                23 Blackburn et al, Avian Invasions, p 244. 24 Blackburn et al, Avian Invasions, pp 244, 185, 257. 25 Otago Daily Times 8 Jul 1863. 26 Nelson Examiner 9 Jun 1864, The Colonist 12 Jul 1864. 27 Otago Daily Times 9 Jan 1865.

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Acclimatisation Society in Melbourne to catch birds and transport them to Australia. He recommended Richard Bills, another ‘well-known bird fancier’ from Brighton, whose ‘lifelong experience of the habits and wants of the feathered tribe, added to his steady character, are the best guarantee for a successful termination to what has hitherto been found a very difficult undertaking’.28 Bills and his son Charles duly achieved a comparatively successful result on their first trip to New Zealand, nearly half of the birds on the Warrior Queen (524 of 1100) reaching Dunedin alive.29 These men went on to be central figures in the successful acclimatisation of English songbirds in both New Zealand (see Table 2) and Australia.

Table 2: English bird shipments from England

to the South Island of New Zealand by Richard and Charles Bills, 1868-1880

Date Shipped Landed alive Source 1867-8 1100 524 (O) OW 8 Feb 1868 1869-70 441 343 (O) OW 12 Feb 1870 1870-1 930 568 (O) OW 11 Feb 1871, ODT 27 Feb 1871 1871-2 1000 375 (C) OW 30 Dec 1871 and 10 Feb 1872 1872-3 806 553 (C) EP 15 Mar 1873, S 3 Mar 1873 1874-5 1010 811 (C) OW 12 Feb 1876 1879-80 1025 775 (C) P 3 Mar 1880 and 6 Mar 1880 Totals 6312 3949 62.7% landed alive

O = Otago, C = Canterbury. Full newspaper names at end of the article.

Thomson, writing in 1922, noted that, of attempted bird species introductions to New Zealand, ‘the record of failures is much greater than the record of successes’. He then listed the 24 species which had become successfully established, including 13 English passerines. In each case, the Bills played a demonstrable role in their introduction (see Table 3). These birds were caught, looked after and, finally, released by the Bills working under contract to the acclimatisation societies of Otago and Canterbury, but they also imported birds for individuals, or on their own behalf for later sale. Since their shipments to the South Island were larger, more consistent and more successful than any others undertaken in the period when New Zealand was colonised by English birds, Richard and Charles Bills clearly emerge as ‘biota barons’ at the heart of this relocation.30

                                                                                                               28 The Field 19 Oct 1867. See also Otago Witness 8 Jan 1870. 29 Otago Witness 1 and 8 Feb 1868. 30 Paul Star, ‘New Zealand's biota barons: Ecological transformation in New Zealand’, Environment and Nature in New Zealand, Vol 6 No 2 (November 2011), pp 1-12. The extent of the Bills family’s involvement in the movement of birds into and out of Australia awaits further research, but see John Low, ‘The lost horse troughs of Audley’, Doryanthes: The Journal of History and Heritage for Southern Sydney Vol 3 No 4 (November 2010), pp 7-12.

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Table 3: All exotic passerines established in New Zealand by 1922 showing minimum numbers successfully landed in South Island

by Richard and Charles Bills, 1868-75

1868 1869 1870 1871 1872 1873 1874 1875 Skylark 50 35 56 15 Thrush 95 42 43 28 74 Blackbird 65 (100) 70 95 62 117 Hedge sparrow 22 80 19 41 11 Rook 4 31 Starling 110 94 31 40 33 House sparrow 3 Chaffinch 42 66 Redpoll 10 11 50 120 120 Goldfinch 40 50 31 60 95 110 Greenfinch 8 (95) Cirl bunting 7 Yellow hammer 8 31 34 180 Note: 100 blackbirds and thrushes (combined total) were landed in 1870; the 95 ‘linnets’ landed in 1875 were probably green linnets (i.e. greenfinches). Sources: Otago Witness 8 Feb 1868, Otago Daily Times 8 Feb 1870 and 27 Feb 1871, Otago Witness 10 Feb 1872, Star 3 Mar 1873, Otago Witness 12 Feb 1876. The significance of their contribution, however, perhaps lay not just in their ability to keep more birds alive during transportation, but also in Richard Bills’ insistence on how the birds were released after they arrived in New Zealand. Prior to his intervention, the usual practice was for the acclimatisation society who had initiated the shipment to distribute the survivors among a wide range of their members, either immediately or after a short recovery period in the society’s aviary. The recipients were either those chosen by the society’s committee, or else they were the highest bidders in a public auction of the birds. The first method was considered the fairest, since it rewarded the most (and generally the most active) members, while the second method produced a healthier bank balance. In both cases the birds were released into the wild, but they were widely scattered, with just a few pairs here and there. Neither approach capitalised on the possible advantages of a more concentrated introduction effort. As ‘Aliquis’ of Oamaru remarked in 1870, the local acclimatisation society ‘had, in its desire to please many, injured the probabilities of the success of their bird colonisation by scattering the birds too much. It is with birds as with men and bees, strong settlements in good situations in each case ensure success’.31 When Richard Bills arrived in Dunedin with his third large shipment, in February 1871, he was able to convince the Otago Acclimatisation Society on this very point:

… the Council has much pleasure in reporting that on no former occasion have birds arrived from England in such excellent condition, a circumstance which may be fairly attributed to the great care bestowed upon them by Mr Bills during the voyage. The greater number of the small birds were liberated

                                                                                                               31 North Otago Times 15 Feb 1870.

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within a few days after their arrival at the Society’s grounds, and in the neighbourhood of Dunedin. Mr Bills strongly recommended that this course should be taken, as by turning out the birds in one place, he urged that the object which the Society has in view, viz stocking the country as soon as possible with valuable insectivorous birds, will have a greater chance of success. Although several subscribers in the country were anxious that small lots of birds should be liberated within the districts where they reside, the Council has every reason to be satisfied with the course which it took.32

Four years later, when the Canterbury Acclimatisation Society received one of Bills’ shipments and proposed to follow the earlier practice and sell them off piecemeal, Otago suggested they reconsider their decision:

Some few years ago, Mr Bills brought out a number of English birds for our local society … [and] the whole lot with the exception of the partridges were turned out in the neighbourhood of Dunedin. The result now speaks for itself in the presence all round the City of blackbirds, thrushes, hedge-sparrows, starlings, linnets [i.e. greenfinches], chaffinches, and goldfinches, in considerable number. By the adoption of this plan, moreover, the distribution of the birds throughout the country districts will be more successfully accomplished than if small lots had been originally liberated here and there. In proof of this assertion, we may mention that the Otago Society has taken steps lately to procure some of the acclimatised birds which are now so numerous near Dunedin for distribution in the country. Last week about forty were obtained, and were turned out in the Oamaru district … the Society has now about sixty birds in hand ready to be taken away. The probability is that before the summer is over many hundreds of healthy strong-winged birds will have been liberated in various parts of the Province without the Society having had to introduce any from Great Britain.33

Appropriately, it was Charles Bills, the son of Richard, who was engaged in this and later ‘secondary releases’ around Otago.34 The detail I have uncovered of the Bills’ work not only provides human interest to complement the ecologists’ analyses of avian introductions and propagule pressure; it also gives us a greater understanding of the role of human agency in the early stages of the invasion pathway. It suggests (though does not prove) that the potential for propagule pressure to influence the success of an introduction was not only the result of more birds being sent more often (as identified by Duncan among others), but of more arriving safely due to better management. It also suggests that the establishment of viable breeding populations may have quickened not just through an increase in the number of birds released but also through an increasing awareness of the need for concentrated releases. Finally, it points to the significance not only of human agency in general, but to the role particular individuals can play in bringing about ecological change or, at least, the speed with which it occurs. Close examination of the acclimatisation record also reveals a more complex and more interactive process than is suggested by the bald figures that ecologists have used in their analyses. As will be seen, this is most strikingly evidenced when looking at skylark introductions, but it is worth remarking first that the role of human                                                                                                                32 Otago Witness 1 Jul 1871. 33 Otago Daily Times 1 Feb 1875. 34 Otago Daily Times 12 Feb 1876.

  12  

agency in the establishment phase remained crucial in the case of every other exotic species as well. It is obvious, though not always stated, that humans continued to enlarge the habitat suitable for European birds by removing native forest cover and replacing it with open land, where they grew the fruit and grain crops which, along with unintentionally introduced weeds, provided European birds with an abundance of familiar foods. Even without physically translocating birds, human agency worked in favour of their radiation out from an initial point of release. Until or unless a European bird species was viewed as a pest, its spread was often also helped by a deliberate reduction in the impact of potential predators, whether animal or human. The bounty given by the Auckland Acclimatisation Society for the killing of native harrier hawks (Circus approximans) is one example of the former.35 To forestall errant humans, an 1861 act provided for ‘the protection of certain Animals and Birds within the Colony of New Zealand … [whereby] in order to afford time for sufficient increase, no Deer, Hare, Swan, Partridge, English Plover, Rook, Starling, Thrush, or Blackbird shall be hunted or taken before the year 1870, and after that time only in our winter months’.36 A closer look at skylark introductions Nelson Province’s Superintendent issued a proclamation in 1863, ‘giving notice that the [birds] about to be imported into the province, and to be liberated for the purposes of breeding, come under the provisions of the Act’ of 1861.37 This action was contemporaneous with the arrival of the Napier in Nelson from England with the remnant (85 of 206 individuals) of a shipment of birds prepared by Edward Bartlett of the London Zoological Gardens for the Provincial Government. Some 23 of 51 skylarks had survived, from among which ‘several pairs’ were released on Nelson racecourse. In all probability, these birds were the largest contributors to the gene pool of New Zealand’s skylarks.38

                                                                                                               35 Daily Southern Cross 12 Mar 1868. The Otago Acclimatisation Society had the same policy: See North Otago Times 25 Jan 1870. 36 The Colonist 13 Sep 1861. 37 Nelson Examiner 24 Dec 1863. 38 The Colonist 8 and 11 Dec 1863, Nelson Examiner 28 Jan 1864. DNA analysis of skylarks from different locations, were it attempted, might confirm this.

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Auckland

Hawkes  Bay

Wairarapa

Wellington

Canterbury

Nelson

62+

24

+

1+

46+

25+

Otago 162+

England

Fig 2: Skylarks captured in England and released in New Zealand, 1859-76

For further details and sources of information, see Appendix: Table 5 Skylarks were imported directly from England to all the major New Zealand provinces (see Figure 2), but at first they only really thrived in Nelson.39 Near the close of the 1860s an Otago observer considered that ‘Several descriptions of English birds may now be said to have been successfully introduced into the Colony [New Zealand], Nelson having the English skylark in considerable numbers, blackbirds and thrushes becoming common in the neighbourhood of Christchurch, and starlings and finches having been seen in various portions of this Province’.40 By 1870, skylarks were ‘in such numbers that they build within the town [of Nelson], and may be heard in the morning from the principal streets’.41 In that year, Canterbury Acclimatisation Society first considered sourcing skylarks from Nelson, rather than direct from England, but the Nelson Society informed them ‘they had no nets to catch them nor any men experienced enough to do so’.42 Only in 1871 did it become practicable, and cheaper, to obtain them from the closer source, with Felix Wakefield pioneering their translocation north from Nelson as far as Auckland and south as far as Invercargill (see Figure 3).43

                                                                                                               39 Records of the introduction and spread of skylarks in British Columbia (from 1903 onwards) are also extensive, suggesting that a comparison with the New Zealand record might be useful. 40 North Otago Times 16 Mar 1869. 41 Nelson Examiner 12 Nov 1870. 42 Star 2 April and 14 May 1870. 43 Otago Witness 25 Feb 1871, The Colonist 7 Apr 1871. See also Philip Temple, A Sort of Conscience: The Wakefields, Auckland University Press, Auckland, 2002, p 527.

  14  

Taranaki

Auckland

Wanganui

Wellington

Canterbury

South  Canterbury

NelsonTasmania

Westland

Victoria100

+

32+

158

23+

284+

165

10

54

Otago 200+Southland 84+

Fig 3: Skylarks captured in Nelson and released elsewhere in New Zealand and in Australia, 1871-76

For further details and sources of information, see Appendix: Table 6

The Bills landed their last consignment of skylarks from England to New Zealand early in 1871, then continued their involvement with the species by going up to Nelson to capture them with a greater proficiency (judging from the numbers) than Wakefield had shown. On behalf of the various acclimatisation societies, Richard Bills released 119 Nelson skylarks in Canterbury in April 1873 and he and Francis Deans released a further 100 in the Tokomairiro area, down the Otago coast from Dunedin, a week later.44 Bills then captured and delivered 100 Nelson skylarks to the Victoria Acclimatisation Society in Melbourne, suggesting that the succession of releases of English-born skylarks in that part of Australia, dating at least as far back as 1854, had failed to establish a flourishing population.45 Disclosures of this kind of detail raise questions about how, in such a case, it is best to apply (or adapt) the ‘invasion pathway’ model referred to earlier. Blackburn and his colleagues describe a pathway that ‘begins in the native range’ of a species and ends in an ‘exotic location’,46 but what are the boundaries of the exotic location? While the data is often classified and considered along national lines (eg ‘New Zealand’ introductions), in practice it may more closely relate to smaller units (eg ‘Nelson’ introductions). Some localised releases fail, while successful ones may later contribute not only to a nationwide spread of a species through suitable habitats but also to the supranational extension of a species’ range (eg to ‘New Zealand and                                                                                                                44 Star 28 Mar and 5 Apr 1873, Otago Daily Times 10 Apr 1873. 45 Nelson Evening Mail 16 Jul 1873, The Colonist 14 Dec 1858. However Long, Introduced Birds of the World, pp 294-296, when listing skylark introductions throughout the world, noted that ‘From introductions in 1862 in South Australia … and in 1863 in Victoria … the Skylark is said to have become firmly established in Australia’. 46 Blackburn et al, Avian Invasions, p 10.

  15  

Australia’). If the boundaries of the exotic location are uncertain, it also becomes unclear where the boundaries lie between introduction and establishment. In 1871 the skylark was probably a transported species in Wellington, an introduced species in Otago, and an established species in Nelson. When the available data is analysed historically over time and classified more specifically by location, the ability to analyse and understand the role of human agency in biological invasions is enhanced. It becomes clearer how the steps along the invasion pathway were negotiated when we are brought close enough to each ‘introduction event’ to find out how propagule pressure has been manipulated. In the case of Nelson skylarks released in coastal Otago, their spread can be tracked one stage further (see Figure 4). The population on the Tokomairiro Plain was already becoming ‘very numerous’ by September 1874, and three years later the birds were so ‘very plentiful’ there, especially in Clarksville just south of Milton, that someone suggested it should have been called Larksville.47 It was in this area that ‘a professional bird-catcher, properly equipped with nets and decoys’ was employed that year by the Otago Acclimatisation to capture skylarks. According to one report this man (who was probably Charles Bills) ‘sent away no less than 60 on Saturday, and states that one morning he caught as many as 22 before breakfast’.48 These birds were then transported and released in different locations throughout Otago and Southland, with some even sent as far north as Timaru.49

                                                                                                               47 Tuapeka Times 16 Sep 1874, Otago Daily Times 12 Sep 1877. 48 Bruce Herald 17 Apr 1877, Otago Daily Times 18 Apr 1877. 49 Otago Daily Times 10 Aug 1877.

  16  

Oamaru

Timaru

Adelaide

Melbourne

Coastal  Otago

Burwood36

Clydevale25

Cromwell25

Queenstown30

Clyde24

Wanaka30

6

48

Dunedin

Blueskin

18

18

Wyndham

Edendale

13

24

c  200

Stewart  Islandc  30

Fig 4: Skylarks captured in coastal Otago and released elsewhere in lower South

Island and in Australia, 1877-80 For further details and sources of information, see Appendix: Table 7

In May 1879 Charles Bills was engaged by the Society to capture more skylarks which (along with locally obtained starlings, chaffinches, yellowhammers, hedge sparrows and pheasants) he released in Stewart Island.50 In the following year, under contract to Canterbury Acclimatisation Society, he also took about 100 pairs of skylarks (along with other introduced species) to the Societies in Adelaide and Melbourne, but it is unclear whether he caught these in Canterbury or in Otago.51 The introduction of skylarks was atypical in the extent to which birds from one internal source (Nelson) were used to create or bolster skylark populations in other parts of New Zealand. With most successfully introduced species, each province saw a succession of imports directly from England. When one local population became established the acclimatisation society might then capture young locally-bred birds for release in the further reaches of their own district or province, but deliberate inter-provincial activity of the Nelson sort was less usual. The spread of New Zealand’s                                                                                                                50 Southland Times 13 and 17 May 1879. These birds were released at Ulva, which is now an open sanctuary managed by the Department of Conservation. The Department has translocated several indigenous bird species to Ulva in recent years. See http://www.doc.govt.nz/parks-and-recreation/places-to-visit/southland/stewart-island-rakiura/ulva-island-open-sanctuary/ 51 By this time Richard Bills had relocated himself from Dunedin to Victoria, but his son Charles stayed on in Dunedin, running a pet shop in George Street from the 1880s until his death in 1904. See his advertisements in Otago Daily Times 27 Dec 1881 and later.

  17  

blackbirds is perhaps more typical: The Auckland society captured a few home-grown birds for release close by, but only rather grudgingly sent them to their Waikato neighbours, whose society was regarded as a branch of their own.52 The Otago society captured then released blackbirds in proximate locations, including those that Charles Bills took to Stewart Island in 1879 and 11 to Queenstown a few weeks later.53 In addition, there are a few examples of Otago blackbirds going further afield – a couple of dozen went to Sydney and Melbourne in 1879, and 52 were sent to Wellington in 188054 – but this was small fry compared to Nelson’s skylark ‘industry’. Acknowledgment of secondary and (in the case of skylarks) tertiary releases of exotic species within New Zealand must surely complicate any future analyses of introduction figures. While these may be examples of human agency of less radical impact than the primary releases of English-bred birds, they improve our knowledge of the invasion pathway by demonstrating a deliberate management of the spread of species that extended much further into the establishment stage than analyses have as yet recognised. Much as the improved survival rate during transportation sped up the impact of propagule pressure, so will this factor have accelerated the rate of spread. A further relevance Ecologists claim that the study of avian invasions has potential significance not just for our understanding of ecological science and of past environments, but also for present human conservation efforts and for future biodiversity. Specifically, it can inform conservation biology, for parallel situations are faced by small numbers of an exotic species seeking to establish in a new location and by small numbers of an endangered native species trying to avoid extinction.55 If there is substance to this claim, a fuller understanding of the process of skylark release and spread in New Zealand, which has resulted in it being ‘very common in all types of open country … from North Cape to Stewart Island’, is of more than historical interest.56 Equally, the spread of (for instance) the blackbird from an initial pool of about a thousand birds to its current status as one of the two commonest species in New Zealand has potential relevance for present-day conservationists as (again, for instance) they build up the total population of the kakapo (Strigops habroptilus), New Zealand’s flightless green parrot, from its present level of just 126 birds.57 Indeed, a direct line can be traced from the effort that early European settlers in New Zealand put into caring for introduced English bird species in the 1860s to the efforts their descendants make to save indigenous species. The knowledge base and the management techniques now employed to promote native species have developed out of earlier experimentation with exotics.58

                                                                                                               52 Waikato Times 31 Jul 1877. 53 Otago Witness 17 May 1879. 54 Otago Daily Times 25 Oct 1879, 12 Aug 1880, 18 Oct 1880. 55 Blackburn et al, p 56. 56 Barrie D Heather and Hugh A Robertson, The Field Guide to the Birds of New Zealand, Viking, Auckland, 1996, p 375. 57 http://www.kakaporecovery.org.nz, accessed 7 March 2012. 58 The transference of support from exotic to indigenous species also indicated a shift in emotional attachments and cultural identity among New Zealand’s European settler population. See Paul Star,

  18  

The pioneering attempt by Richard Henry to translocate kakapo to a safe haven on Resolution Island in the 1890s is increasingly recognised and heralded as the precursor of the current kakapo recovery programme, which is run by New Zealand’s Department of Conservation and centred on Whenua Hou (Codfish Island) off Stewart Island.59 What is less well known is that Henry’s activities were directly sponsored and assisted by G M Thomson and his colleagues at the Otago Acclimatisation Society and built on an existing tradition and experience of translocation. Henry’s first assistant, in 1894, was Andrew Burt, the son of the Acclimatisation Society’s ranger John Burt. In 1901 his assistant was Arthur Deans, the son of the Society’s curator Francis Deans.60 From the 1870s, Francis Deans was closely involved first with Richard and then with Charles Bills in the translocation of exotic birds (and also of fish ova) into and around the Otago area. There will undoubtedly have been some transfer of knowledge along this human chain.61 Conclusion Australian botanist and rainforest expert D M J S Bowman conceived of environmental history as ‘an emerging field where the previously disparate intellectual traditions of ecology and history intersect to create a new and fundamentally interdisciplinary field of enquiry’.62 As a historian by training, whose interest lies with environmental history, I have written about biological invasion as part of that field in which insights from ecological and historical research can be drawn together. In the case of the biological invasion of New Zealand triggered by Europeans, it was led by people who left an extensive written account of what they did, of what they saw happening, and of what they thought of it. Now that the digitisation of early newspapers has facilitated access to many of these accounts, there is the opportunity to revisit and revise the figures used by ecologists since the 1990s to analyse the role of propagule pressure in introduction success. Such a revision is important to invasion ecology, given that propagule pressure is widely seen as a key determinant in the success of an introduction; and only with an understanding of why an introduction succeeds can ecologists properly assess the biological and environmental factors behind a species’ degree of success in establishing.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             ‘Native bird protection, national identity and the rise of preservation in New Zealand to 1914’. New Zealand Journal of History Vol 36 No 2 (October 2002) pp 123-136. 59 For a readable account of both these endeavours, and of some similar efforts outside New Zealand, see William Stolzenburg, Rat Island: Predators in Paradise and the World’s Greatest Wildlife Rescue, Bloomsbury, London, 2011. Resolution Island was perhaps the world’s first gazetted island sanctuary for native birds, and Henry the first person funded by a government to rescue them. 60 Susanne and John Hill, Richard Henry of Resolution Island, John McIndoe, Dunedin, 1987, pp 116-122, 131-135, 158-159, 262-263. 61 Furthermore, while the Bills family’s activities developed within the context of an international acclimatisation movement in the 1860s, they also grew out of the ongoing global trade in caged songsters, with an estimated 100,000 birds (especially canaries, but also skylarks and blackbirds) imported into the United States alone in 1875. See Tuapeka Times 3 May 1876. 62 D M J S Bowman, ‘Future eating and country keeping: What role has environmental history in the management of biodiversity?’, Journal of Biogeography Vol 29 (2001) pp 549-564.

  19  

This paper has looked at the nineteenth-century introduction to New Zealand of skylarks and blackbirds. In the case of skylarks, I have pursued available information beyond the national to the regional level. Human-assisted introduction has been traced from England to Nelson and elsewhere, then from Nelson to Otago and elsewhere, and finally from Coastal Otago to elsewhere in the lower South Island. This example reveals a more active and sustained role for human agency in the spread of a species than earlier analyses have acknowledged. My research also suggests the importance that can attach to the actions and expertise of particular individuals, such as Richard and Charles Bills. Overall, the evidence presented has been of more extensive, more conducted and more layered acclimatisation than has previously been recognised. I have noted, finally, that exotic acclimatisation in the past and indigenous restoration in the present display a similar preoccupation with small populations of valued species and with technical improvements in their management. A fuller understanding of historic acclimatisations, such as those described, may contribute something not only to environmental history and to invasion ecology, but to the current practice of conservation biology as well.

  20  

Appendix: Further details and sources of information63 Table 4: Introduction of blackbirds to New Zealand to 1885 The following data differentiates international and *inter-provincial introductions, and lists the minimum number of blackbirds intended for release which reached their destination alive. Newspaper references were checked up to the end of 1885 through http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast accessed in February 2012. This source yielded 3205 references to <blackbird> and/or <blackbirds>. Location (and total) Year Number Source of information Auckland (189)64 1862 10 DSC 17 Sep 1862 1867 16 DSC 4 Jan 1867 1867 3 DSC 29 Jul 1867 1868 156 DSC 10 Feb 1868, HBH 15 Feb 1868 1868 at least 2 DSC 13 Mar 1868 1868 at least 2 EP 27 Mar 1878, DSC 3 Apr 1868 Tauranga (2) 1882 at least 2 BOPT 28 Nov 1882 Hawkes Bay (81 +9*)1865 4 HBH 5 Dec 1865 1873 53 WH 19 Mar 1873, P 20 Mar 1873 1874 24 C 3 Nov 1874

1880 at least 3* OW 29 May 1880, HBH 15 Mar 1880 1885 6* DT 20 Apr 1885

Wanganui (8) 1869 8 WH 15 Jan 1869 and 11 Jan 1880 Wairarapa (8) 1873 8 EP 15 Mar 1873 Wellington (36 +52*) 1869 at least 27 EP 6 and 13 Jan 1869 1876 9 EP 8 Jul 1876

1880 52* ODT 18 Oct 1880 Nelson (47) 1863 21 NE 10 Dec 1863, C 11 Dec 1863 1863 15 NE 3 and 12 Dec 1863 1864 7 NZS 2 Jul 1864, NE 7 Jul 1864 1868 2 NE 25 Apr 1868 1868 at least 2 DSC 15 Jun 1868 Canterbury (484) 1864 2 ODT 4 Mar 1864 1865 at least 2 P 2 Feb 1865 1867 46 P 18 Jan 1867 1868 153 P 12 Feb 1868

1869 at least 4 NE 23 Jan 1869, S 13 Feb 1869 1871 3 NE 22 Apr 1871 1872 95 OW 1 Feb 1872

                                                                                                               63 Abbreviations of newspaper names used in all tables: BH = Bruce Herald (Otago), BOPT = Bay of Plenty Times, C = Colonist (Nelson), DSC = Daily Southern Cross (Auckland), DT = Daily Telegraph (Hawkes Bay), EP = Evening Post (Wellington), GRA = Grey River Argus (West Coast), HBH = Hawkes Bay Herald, NE = Nelson Examiner, NEM = Nelson Evening Mail, NOT = North Otago Times, NZS = New Zealand Spectator (Wellington), ODT = Otago Daily Times, OW = Otago Witness, P = Press (Canterbury), S = Star (Canterbury), TH = Taranaki Herald, TT = Tuapeka Times (Otago), WH = Wanganui Herald, WI = Wellington Independent. 64  Thomson, The Naturalisation of Animals and Plants in New Zealand, pp 146-7, states that 8 blackbirds were also brought to Auckland in 1865.  

  21  

1873 62 S 28 Feb 1873 1875 117 P 4 May 1875 Otago (152) 1865 2 ODT 19 Oct and 17 Jun 1865 1867 2 ODT 1 Nov 1867 1868 65 OW 1 Feb 1868 1870 at least 9 NOT 11 Feb 1870, ODT 19 Feb 1870 1871 70 OW 4 Mar and 21 Jul 1871 1876 4 ODT 17 Mar 1876 Table 5: Introduction of skylarks to New Zealand, 1859-76 The following data, which relates to international introductions only, lists the minimum number of skylarks intended for release which reached their destination alive. For *inter-provincial introductions, see Table 6. Newspaper references were checked up to the end of 1885 through http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast accessed in February 2012. This source yielded 3180 references to <skylark> and/or <skylarks>.65 Location (and total) Year Number Source of information Auckland (62+)66 1862 10 DSC 8 Apr and 17 Sep 1862

1863 1 ODT 8 Jul 1863 1868 4 DSC 10 Feb and 12 Mar 1868 1868 at least 30 DSC 14 Mar, 2 Apr and 6 Apr 1868 1868 16 DSC 3 Apr 1868 1869 1 NE 24 Feb 1869

Hawkes Bay (25) 1873 7 WH 10 Mar 1873 1874 18 C 3 Nov 1874

Wairarapa (+) 1865 prob. a few WI 30 Mar and 10 Oct 1865 Wellington (1+)67 1869 at least 1 EP 6 and 12 Jan 1869, WI 14 Jan 1869 Nelson (25+) 1860 0 DSC 17 Jan 1860

1863 a number C 3 Nov 1863 1863 23 C 11 Dec 1863 1863 2 NE 12 Dec 1863 1864 1 NZS 2 Jul 1864, C 12 Jul 1864 1865 a number NE 25 Mar 1865

                                                                                                               65  The Wellington reference, one of the Canterbury references and five of the Nelson references are to introductions too small or non-specific to meet the criteria set by Duncan for introductions, so are not included in data in Table 1. The Wellington bird (a male, the only survivor of a shipment of 84 skylarks) was given to the owner of a female bird already present in Wellington, so may have had New Zealand progeny. This record illustrates difficulties with the data. There were undoubtedly more arrivals than are noted here. Some will never have been recorded, while others will have been mentioned in newspapers or sources which have not been accessed. In addition, some records found are very imprecise, or are more likely to refer to caged songbirds not intended for release. None of these birds appear in this analysis. Thomson, in his 1922 analysis, did not precisely indicate his sources. The following footnotes give his figures (later reflected in Duncan’s figures) where they appear to relate to introductions other than those tabulated.  66  Thomson, The Naturalisation of Animals and Plants in New Zealand, pp 140-2, states that 10 skylarks were also brought to Auckland in 1867.  67  Thomson, The Naturalisation of Animals and Plants in New Zealand, pp 140-2, states that 52 skylarks were also brought to Wellington in 1874, and a further 56 in 1875.  

  22  

1868 1 NEM 11 Jun 1868 Canterbury (46+)68 1859 prob. a few NE 12 Feb 1869

1863 6 ODT 8 Jun 1863 1865 at least 2 P 2 Feb 1865 1867 13 ODT 31 Jan 1867 1868 at least 6 ODT 21 Jan 1868, S 13 Feb 1869 1872 at least 4 S 6,7 and 8 Feb 1872 1873 15 OW 28 Feb 1873, S 5 Mar 1873

Otago (162+) 1866/7 at least 4 BH 30 Aug 1866, ODT 6 May 1867 1867 at least 6 ODT 1 Nov 1867 1868 50 OW 1 Feb 1868 1870 35 ODT 5 Feb 1870 1871 56 ODT 27 Feb 1871 1876 11 ODT 17 Mar 1876

Table 6: Skylarks captured in Nelson and released elsewhere in New Zealand and Australia, 1871-76 Location (and total) Year Number Source of information Auckland (32+) 1871 at least 12 DSC 6 Jun 1871

1873 at least 20 DSC 10 Apr and 13 May 1873 Taranaki (+) 1871 several TH 1 Feb 1871 Wanganui (158) 1873 17 EP 12 Mar 1873

1873 30 WH 10 Apr 1873 1874 100 WH 14 Apr 1875 1875 11 WH 26 Jan 1875

Wellington (23+) 1871 at least 20 WI 2 May and 12 Dec 1871 1873 3 cases NEM 26 Aug 1873

Canterbury (284+) 1871 at least 8 S 8 Apr 1871 1871 36 NE 3 Jun 1871 1872 14 GRA 29 Jan 1873 1873 119 S 28 Mar and 5 Apr 1873 1875 107 S 28 Jun 1875

S. Canterbury (165) 1875 165 TH 12 Nov 1875 Westland (54) 1871 3 C 15 Aug 1871

1871 6 GRA 21 Aug 1871 1873 21 GRA 21 Apr 1873 1876 24 GRA 30 Oct 1876

Otago (200+) 1872 a number OW 6 Apr 1872 1873 100 OW 10 Apr 1873 1873 52 ODT 12 Jun 1873 1875 at least 48 ODT 14 Apr and 9 Oct 1875

Southland (84+) 1872 a number ST 21 Jun 1872                                                                                                                68  Thomson, The Naturalisation of Animals and Plants in New Zealand, pp 140-2, states that 18 skylarks were also brought to Canterbury in 1871, but this does not explain Duncan’s much higher figure for Canterbury introductions. This seems to be depend on G R Williams’ mention of 300 skylarks introduced into South Canterbury in 1875, in G A Knox (ed), The Natural History of Canterbury, A H and A W Reed, Wellington, 1969, p 443. The 165 birds from Nelson, released in South Canterbury and referred to in Appendix 6, below, probably constituted part of the 300 total.  

  23  

1873 84 ST 16 May 1873 Victoria (100) 1873 100 NEM 16 Jul 1873 Tasmania (10) 1875 10 S 28 Jun 1875 Table 7: Skylarks captured in coastal Otago and released elsewhere in lower South Island and in Australia, 1877-80 Location Year Number Source of information Timaru 1877 48 ODT 10 Aug 1877 Oamaru 1877 6 ODT 10 Aug 1877 Blueskin 1877 18 ODT 10 Aug 1877 Dunedin 1877 18 ODT 10 Aug 1877 Wanaka 1877 30 ODT 10 Aug 1877 Queenstown 1879 30 ODT 20 Apr 1877, ODT 10 Aug 1877 Cromwell 1877 25 TT 11 Apr 1877, ODT 10 Aug 1877 Clyde 1877 24 ODT 10 Aug 1877 Clydevale 1877 25 ODT 10 Aug 1877 Burwood 1877 36 ODT 10 Aug 1877 Edendale 1877 24 ODT 10 Aug 1877 Wyndham 1877 13 ODT 10 Aug 1877 Stewart Island 1879 about 30 ODT 13 Feb 1877, 13 and 17 May 1879 S Aus and Victoria 1880 about 200 S 27 Mar 1880, 1 Feb 1881