Cultural control of possums
Tane Mahuta (God of the Forests and Birds) represented in the foyer entrance carvings at Landcare Research, Lincoln by Ngai Tahu master carver George Edwards assisted by Wiremu Gray and David Johns. Image – Cissy Pan.
About 15 years ago I was asked ’How would ancient (pre-European) Māori have addressed the possum problem in a culturally appropriate manner if possums had co-existed with them?’ My views have not changed. The answer is simple. Māori would not have seen excessive possum numbers as a problem at all. Instead the possum would have been considered an extremely valuable resource in many ways.
As a priority, possum skins with the fur attached would have been used to make kākahu (cloaks) and warm clothing. If possums were plentiful, the furs would also have been made into high quality mats and blankets. The skins would likely have been cut into continuous strips to make a type of string and thread for sewing and korowai (clothing and cloaks). Furthermore, if this thread were plaited, it would have been used to make medium strength ropes and fishing lines. If such rope (with a length of muka fibre as the central core) were re-plaited a really strong and durable multi-purpose rope would have been possible.
Possum long bones would have been used for needles and the vertebrae used for necklaces and knucklebone games.
Possum flesh would have been cooked in many creative ways including grilling on hot stones, being boiled with tikouka, nīkau, pūhā, poroporo, parataniwha stalks or kōrau shoots, cooked in a hangi, barbecued over hot coals, smoked, or preserved (huahua) through drying and preserving in its own fat.
Possum offal (intestines, stomach, liver, heart, lungs, and kidneys) would have been classed as ‘status delicacies’ and consumed at large hākari (feasts). The head (eyes, brains, and tongue) would have been accorded the status of highly prized treats and eaten only by the chiefs (rangatira), tohunga (priests) and high ranking visitors.
Thus, ancient Māori would have made full use of the resource, but how would they have specifically addressed a population explosion of possums and the consequential depletion of many of the forest species critical to their hunter-gatherer lifestyle? In my opinion local chiefs would have:
- Held competitions to determine who could catch the most possums over a given period, with:
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- The winner made the chief advisor (tohu rangatira, symbol of leadership) because of his ability to provide food in abundance;
- Such hunters accorded the status of ‘tohunga whai kai’ (expert hunter) and able to marry as many wives as desired;
- Stories told and retold of the prowess of hunters able to catch 250 possums (or some other high number) in one night;
- His skills, knowledge and expertise sought-after by many aspirants to fame and fortune,
- Decreed possum hearts (or livers, kidneys, eyes, or brains) the most highly prized food at any hākari, so any rangatira who could provide 3000 (say) such delicacies at a single hākari (feast) would be the envy of every other tribe in the country for generations,
- Encouraged adults to design ingenious traps to catch possums,
- Arranged for children to be taught competitive ‘games’ of climbing trees and catching as many possums as they could in the daytime,
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- Part of this ‘game’ would involve:
- Skinning a possum (including drying, treating and colouring the skin using hīnau bark);
- Gutting a possum (including cleaning and separating the various organs);
- Preparing possums for eating;
- Cooking: smoking, hangi, huahua (drying and preserving in fat), and tunutunu (barbecue on hot coals).
Most importantly, if possum numbers fell to an unsustainable level, a chief would impose a rāhui (temporary hunting ban), to allow possum numbers to recover before further hunting was allowed.
In my view such a cultural approach to killing possums, complete with variants to accommodate modern-day living (e.g. only one wife per hunter) is a preferable option in easily accessible habitat to controlling them with sodium fluoroacetate (1080), brodifacoum, cyanide or any other forms of indiscriminate killing to waste. Is it worth a try?
Kevin Prime (Ngatihine)
Contact: kevin.prime@courts.govt.nz