ABSTRACT
Moa were a group of large, flightless birds endemic to New Zealand that became extinct within the last few hundred years. They were related to other large, flightless birds such as the Australian emu and South African rhea, and ranged in size from about 15 to over 200 kg (Cracraft 1974, 1981, Prager et al. 1976, deBoer 1980, Anderson 1983c, p. 8). Although there has been considerable debate about the actual number of moa species that inhabited New Zealand (Archey 1941, Oliver 1949, Scarlett 1972, McDowell 1973, Caughley 1977), current opinion favors something in the order of a dozen species (Cracraft 1976, Kooyman, in press, Millener 1982). Moa were extensively hunted by the first Polynesian inhabitants of New Zealand, especially in the southern half of the South Island (Duff 1977, Anderson 1983c, Davidson 1984, pp. 132-4), and the hunting of moa had both a direct and an indirect role in their ultimate extinction (Anderson 1983a, 1984).
