QUATERNARY FOSSIL FAUNAS FROM CAVES IN TAKAKA VALLEY AND ON TAKAKA HILL, NORTHWEST NELSON, SOUTH-ISLAND, NEW-ZEALAND

The late Quaternary fossil vertebrate faunas from 43 caves in Oligocen e limestones and Ordovician marbles in the Takaka Valley and on Takaka Hill, northwest Nelson, New Zealand, are described and discussed. Dep ositional environments are described and interpreted. Major sites, inc luding Ngarua Cave, Hawkes Cave, Kairuru Cave, Hobsons Tome, and Irvin es Tome are described in detail. Many sites on Takaka Hill have been d amaged by casual collectors since their discovery around 1900. Most si tes were pitfall traps, but some deposits had been redistributed by wa ter. Two deposits were attributed to an accumulation of material from pellets ejected by laughing owls (Sceloglaux albifacies), and of these the spectacularly rich Predator Cave site provided a large sample of small vertebrates. The fossil faunas included 42 species of land snail s, three species of leiopelmatid frog, a tuatara, three species of gec koes, one or more species of skink, at least 58 (including two introdu ced) species of bird, three species of bats, two rats and the house mo use. Eighteen radiocarbon dates show that the faunas of the Hill and t he Valley sites were laid down during the past 30,000 years. The dates ranged from 400 +/- 62 to 29,011 +/- 312 yrs sp. The date of 29,011 /- 312 yrs sp, recorded from a specimen in Hawkes Cave, supplants the date of 25,070 yrs sp from Te Ana Titi as the oldest cave specimen kno wn in New Zealand. The introduced birds plus one rat and the mouse wer e in laughing owl middens, indicating that deposition by this species continued into the late 1800s or early 1900s. Two distinct faunal asse mblages were present in both areas. These demonstrate that there were regional extinctions due to climatic and associated environmental chan ges at the end of the Otira (last) Glaciation. In contrast to the cont inental regions, where humans were already present 10,000 years ago, a nd where the causes of post-glacial megafaunal extinctions are subject to intense debate, no species became extinct in New Zealand until abo ut 1000 years ago when humans arrived. The fauna from the last (Otira) Glaciation and Late Glacial periods (30,000 to 10,000 yrs BP), contai ned taxa typical of similar-aged deposits at Oparara and farther south on the West Coast, and of Holocene deposits in the east and south of the South Island, The faunas in deposits of Holocene age (<10,000 yrs sp) contained taxa typical of local forests at the time of European co ntact, plus extinct taxa. Some taxa were common to faunas of both ages . The Otiran and Late Glacial fauna were characterised by the moas Pac hyornis elephantopus, P. australis, Euryapleryx geranoides and Megalap teryx didinus, but Anomalopteryx didiformis was present only in Holoce ne deposits. Dinornis struthoides and D. novaezealandiae were present in deposits of both ages. The duck Euryanas finschi, eagle Harpagornis moorei, and Aptornis and takahe Porphyrio mantelli were also found on ly in Otiran - Late Glacial - age deposits. Petrels were very rare in the Takaka area. Some samples of Anas chlorotis and Cyanoramphus spp. were large enough for statistical analysis, and the ranges in individu al size, measured by lengths of various longbones, are presented and d iscussed for the fossil populations. Remains of some anatids, includin g Hymenolaimus, were common in Takaka Hill deposits at considerable di stances from surface water, suggesting that these waterfowl were then more terrestrial than since mammalian predators arrived. Bones of thre e further individuals of Dendroscansor decurvirostris found in Hobsons Tome constitute the third record for this taxon. The Hill and the Val ley faunas are compared and discussed, and the regional fauna as a who le is compared with those from Oparara, the West Coast, Poukawa Swamp, Waitomo, and the Far North dunelands. The fossil faunas of Takaka Hil l demonstrate that there has been no interchange of North and South Is land terrestrial vertebrates over the last 30,000 years, and they ther efore suggest that there was no Cook Strait land bridge at any rime du ring the Otira Glaciation.