Kuri dogs were man's best friend in New Zealand for 600 years. Now Dunedin biologist Dr Priscilla Wehi is trying to determine why they became extinct 150 years ago, Mark Price reports.
They were used for food and clothing, they hunted kiwi, they were early Maori's ''best friend''; they were the kuri dog.
They lived in New Zealand for 600 years.
And about 150 years ago they became extinct.
Now Dunedin Landcare Research ecologist and conservation biologist Dr Priscilla Wehi is trying to determine why, and what their disappearance says about historical changes in society.
Dr Wehi told the Otago Daily Times recently she initiated her three-year, $300,000 Marsden Fund project because of her interest in the relationship between ecology and society: ''how what we do as humans influences the demise, or survival, of species''.
Kuri dog, she said, were of interest because of their once close relationship with humans.
''They are the last species you might expect to disappear.''
Dr Wehi said it was difficult to pin down exactly when they disappeared.
''But the last kuri may even have been kuri in Central Otago and Southland, although we don't know whether these were purebred or not.''
A correspondent to the Otago Weekly in 1890 noted a sighting of a pack of four in the Hokonui Hills in 1861.
''Those dogs were all white, and about the size of a moderate-sized collie dog with, as near as I could tell, bushy, curved tails.
''At that time I thought it was the most beautiful dog I had ever seen.''
Dr Wehi said kuri with white coats were especially prized by Maori cloak weavers.
''When [Captain James] Cook arrived in New Zealand, many of the chiefs that he saw wore dog skin cloaks.
''Feather cloaks mostly did not appear until the mid-19th century, when kuri were dying out.''
Kuri were an important part of the Maori economy, she said, and a ''very precious kuri'' might have lived in a house on clean mats, and would have been taken great care of.
They accompanied the earliest of Maori explorers of New Zealand and traditional stories depicted a dog that was a loved companion appreciated for being clever.
''However, they were a valued food item, particularly for important guests, and their skins were used for cloaks.''
Many kuri bones had been found buried in midden sites throughout the South Island, Dr Wehi said.
Prof Ian Barber, from the department of archaeology at the University of Otago, would assist the project by analysing some of these centuries-old recovered dog bones to ''get some ideas about kuri diet at earlier times''.
The results of that work, and other isotope work on kuri hair by GNS chemist Dr Karyne Rogers, of Wellington, would help establish the origins of surviving kuri skins and cloaks, she said.
''One of the sad things is that many of the taonga in museums no longer have recorded details about where they come from, or who they belonged to.''
Dr Wehi said the Otago kuri hair was ''really vital'' to this study because it came from a specific known location.
''We don't have many hair samples where that is true,'' she explained.