The Devonport Flagstaff Page 9
December 2, 2016
Martin doubts himself after pheasant drops in for tune-up A pheasant sighting in Devonport village could be the latest addition to Mt Victoria’s colourful wildlife. The mountain has a reputation for its rat population, and earlier this year a possum was sighted. Now it has fowl too. Last month, Dave Martin was working away by himself in his car repair shop in Wynyard St, when he heard the pitter-patter of little feet behind him. When he turned around, he saw a large pheasant running into his the garage. “I thought this is it, I have lost it,” he says. The bird hid behind a car in the back corner of the workshop. “It was very scared and very still, so I went across the street to Chiasso and they all came and had a look,” Martin says. Chiasso barista Amy Cunningham called the SPCA for help. “The lady told me she had grown up around Mt Victoria and seen wild pheasants there. She said it had probably flown down from there and asked whether we could take it back up,” she says. “She told me how to grab it – with confidence, gloves and covered arms. And she said to put a towel on its head if I had one, to make it dark.” Cunningham grabbed a large box, put on her hoody and a long pair of Martin’s work gloves. “And then I just grabbed it. He wiggled, just a little bit,” she says. The coffee-supplies box was just big enough to fit the pheasant’s long tail, says Cunningham. Once inside, she put a coffee sack over its head and closed the lid. That’s when Anthony Curach walked past on his way to Baked@Devonport’s Wynyard Street office. He offered to drive the pheasant up the mountain in his car. “Amy and I put the box put on the back seat of my Honda and drove about halfway up the mountain to release it,” he says. They parked outside the Devonport Bunker. “As soon as we opened the box he flew out like a bullet. It was fantastic,” Curach says. But the pheasant didn’t leave without
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Wynyard Street’s pheasant rescue team… From left: Anthony Curach, Amy Cunningham and David Martin. The pheasant is pictured in the corner of the workshop (below). a parting message. Cunningham says: “He flew straight up with a whole lot of poop going out of his backside. It was his way of saying ‘Thanks guys!’ I’m sure.” Since then, the Flagstaff learned about another local pheasant sighting, this one in the back garden of Vauxhall Rd resident Mickey Smith. Roger Giles, Mt Victoria’s unofficial guardian, says while he hasn’t seen pheasants on the mountain recently, he saw several feeding on vetch plants there in the past. Vetch is in bloom at the moment. “They lived on the golf course and would go back there after feeding on the mountain,” he says.
Bomb alert at Navy Museum A backpack left behind at the playground outside the Navy Museum sparked a police bomb-squad alert. The incident occurred on the night of 16 November, after about 100 peace activists had protested against a military conference held in Auckland earlier in the day. The Flagstaff learned the cul-de-sac end of King Edward Parade was closed off to residents as a robot explored the car park outside the museum and retrieved the backpack. Nothing of concern was found, a police spokesperson said.