Whaling in New Zealand and in 1844 the last of the early onshore stations closed. Still, Captain Nye of the barque "Mount Wolleston" reported in 1879 that the northern whales averaged 10lbs of whale bone to each barrel of oil, and at that time were the most profitable whales caught. The following table presents the average yield of oil and bone to the northern and southern whale: A later shore station, Perano's of Tory Channel, Cook Strait caught 4200 whales (mainly humpback) between 1911 and 1964, when the last whale was caught in New Zealand waters. Since 1978, whales within New Zealand’s Exclusive Economic
Stoats in New Zealand Stoats in New Zealand Stoats ("Mustela erminea") were introduced into New Zealand to control introduced rabbits and hares, but are now a major threat to the native bird population. The natural range of the stoat is limited to parts of the Northern Hemisphere. Immediately before human settlement, New Zealand did not have any land-based mammals apart from bats, but Polynesian and European settlers introduced a wide variety of animals. The rabbit was introduced by European settlers as a food and game animal, and by the 1870s it was becoming a serious threat to the newly developed farming economy. Farmers began