Hakawai (mythology)

Hakawai, also Hōkioi in the North Island,[1] was to the New Zealand Māori people, a mythological bird that was sometimes heard but not usually seen.

[2] It was considered to be a gigantic bird of prey and was described (as the Hōkioi) by a Ngāti Apa chief, to the Governor of New Zealand Sir George Grey, as: Its colour was red and black and white.

[2] The last known individuals of the snipe died in 1964 on Big South Cape Island following the accidental introduction of black rats there.

[4] Snipe in the genera Gallinago and Lymnocryptes, as well as the closely related woodcocks Scolopax, make courtship display flights, at dusk and on moonlit nights, producing mechanical sounds called "drumming", "bleating" or "winnowing", through the vibration of their modified outer tail feathers caused by the rush of air in the course of a power dive.

The vocal component was a disyllabic call, repeated five times, identical to one of the ground displays given by territorial male Chatham Island Snipe.

This was followed by a loud roar, similar to a jet passing overhead, as the bird swooped over the 6 m canopy at high speed.

I found indirect evidence of this on two of the 24 adult male snipe that I handled on South East Island in November 1983 – January 1984.