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  • Rights: The Royal Society, TVNZ 7 in partnership with the Ministry of Science and Innovation
    Published 9 January 2012 Referencing Hub media
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    Prized by Māori and valued as a delicacy in many cultures, the eel is a highly sought-after creature. Commercial eel exports are worth $6 million to New Zealand annually, with the price paid for eel being higher than snapper. However, it could be much more if supply met demand.

    As eel populations1 have been observed to be dropping for years, Whakatāne iwi2 Ngāti Awa3 are now combining traditional knowledge – mātauranga4 – and scientific study to count the eels and hopefully boost their numbers.

    New Zealand has two eel species5long-fin and short-fin. Mysterious, secretive creatures, the long-fin are legendary climbers, making their way to inland streams by wriggling up waterfalls and even dams. They breed only once, at the end of their long life, after a swim of thousands of kilometres to spawn6 in the ocean somewhere near Tonga, never to return.

    Commercial fishing, wetland7 loss and the construction of huge hydro dams have all contributed to the eel’s population8 and migration decline9. Fewer eels are making the long journey to spawn, so fewer elvers10 are drifting back to New Zealand.

    For years, Ngāti Awa and other iwi have been helping eels to bypass river obstacles by guiding them into traps and transporting them up or downstream by hand. Now, as the obstacles get bigger, Ngāti Awa is combining mātauranga and science to create an innovative model for a sustainable11 eel industry, with knowledge gathered at hui12 attended by scientists and commercial eel exporters from around New Zealand. The goal is to have a sustainable export industry, customary fishing and a growing eel population existing alongside each other.

    Find out more

    Encourage your students to learn more about the impact of habitat13 loss by taking part in these activities:

    Read these article to find out more about human impact on marine environments and our rivers. In Give our native fish a hand! learn about the many different ways people can help their local stream environments.

    Transcript

    VOICEOVER:
    Eel populations in New Zealand’s rivers have been dropping for years and the loss of this important resource is the subject of an innovative new approach lead by Māori.

    VOICEOVER:
    Eels are a delicacy in many cultures, and commercial eel exports earns New Zealand exporters about $6 million dollars a year, but it could be much more. If supply could meet demand.

    Ever since Māori settled in Aotearoa14, the eel – tuna15 in Māori - have meant not only food but prestige – the mana16 of laying on a feast for visitors.

    JOHN HOHAPATA-OKE:
    Eels are extremely important to us, they’re a taonga17 specie for all Maori. To lose the eel would be a travesty.

    VOICEOVER:
    Long fin eels only breed once leaving our swamps and rivers and heading over 1000 kilometres north to breed and die, as their tiny offspring then make the long journey home.

    DR MICK KEARNEY:
    The numbers of long fins out of this catchment18, the migrating ones are declining19. And then from the other end, we know that the number of elvers, which are coming up Matahina Dam which we catch and transfer, those numbers are declining as well. So there’s that correlation20 you know, if there’s not the big long fins spawning21 it doesn't take a rocket scientist to work out that A there’s going to be less elvers or baby ones coming back in the system.

    VOICEOVER:
    Juvenile eels known as elvers, grow up to 12 centimetres long and can migrate over a 100 kilometres inland during summer.
    In the past Māori built wooden wares to guide adult eels into traps, but today the obstacles are a great deal larger.

    BILL KERRISON:
    What are we seeing here? A disaster to the adult eel fisheries.
    They get caught up in the penstock22 screens on their downward migration and the elvers were just climbing the whole station and ‘cause the sun comes out and they dry them up in 30 seconds.

    VOICEOVER:
    Bill has been helping eels bypass the obstacles for years.

    BILL KERRISON:
    We catch them here and we have our tanks and we take them down below Matahina Dam and release from there.
    My grandmother lived on the river for 84 years in a raupo hut. We were brought up with the tuna.

    VOICEOVER:
    Ministry of Science and Innovation23 funding is bringing together that mātauranga – Māori customary knowledge, with a scientific study into eel population in order24 to design an eel management plan.

    DR MICK KEARNEY:
    We don’t know how many eels are in here, you know so when you make a fisheries plan, how do you know how much you can take out. So it’s a lot of the real basic data25 that my research is going to look at.
    Ideally with the MSI funding we’ll be able to create a model of where are the Iwi, or community based fisheries can incorporate what we’ve done, improve on it or just pick it up and run with it.

    BILL KERRISON (Yelling from the boat):
    Gees they’re big eels in here.
    This is the sustainability of a good lake.

    VOICEOVER:
    And the eel’s sustainability movement is growing. An Iwi lead national eel association will bring together Iwi and industry to coordinate on tackling the eel issue.

    JOHN HOHAPATA-OKE:
    There’s often been conflict between commercial and customary users. What we’re proposing with the national body is that everybody’s working with everybody. There is a huge opportunity for Iwi to be involved in the commercial side of this taonga. To me it’s a really great fit where we’re creating jobs, we’re creating economic opportunities…and we’re sustaining the taonga at the same time, so it’s a win-win for everybody.

    VOICEOVER:
    Ultimately the goal is to grow eel numbers for export as well as for kai, and the price of fish? With the cost of eel higher than snapper and declining habitat, the key is to find a way to balance the cultural, commercial and environmental pressure26 on the humble eel. To protect this taonga for future generations.

    BILL KERRISON:
    That’s it my friends, she’s all over.

    Acknowledgements:
    This is part of the Innovation Stories series produced in partnership with the Ministry of Science and Innovation, it featured on TVNZ 7 during the Spotlight on Science + Innovation month in August 2011.

    1. population: In biology, a population is a group of organisms of a species that live in the same place at a same time and that can interbreed.
    2. iwi: Māori tribe or large community, often consisting of several hapū (clans) bound together by common ancestors.
    3. awa: Māori word for river.
    4. mātauranga: Māori cultural knowledge and understanding of the world; Māori wisdom.
    5. species: (Abbreviation sp. or spp.) A division used in the Linnean system of classification or taxonomy. A group of living organisms that can interbreed to produce viable offspring.
    6. spawn: The act of reproduction of aquatic creatures such as fishes, amphibians, crustaceans and mollusks. The mixing of the sperm of a male and the eggs of a female of the species. In mycology, the mycellium of mushrooms.
    7. wetland: An area of land that is saturated with water, often referred to as a swamp or bog. Wetlands may be seasonally or permanently water-logged with vegetation adapted for life under those soil conditions. Wetlands are known as repo in te reo Māori.
    8. population: In biology, a population is a group of organisms of a species that live in the same place at a same time and that can interbreed.
    9. decline: The gradual and continuous loss of something such as bird numbers or sea ice.
    10. elvers: Juvenile eels.
    11. sustainable: A way of using natural products so they are available for future generations.
    12. hui: Māori word for a gathering, meeting or assembly.
    13. habitat: The natural environment in which an organism lives.
    14. Aotearoa: The Māori name for New Zealand, meaning Land of the Long White Cloud.
    15. tuna: 1. A generic Māori word used to describe freshwater eels. There are numerous other specific names that relate to tribal origins and appearance. There are various species of eel, including the longfin eel, Anguilla dieffenbachii and shortfin eel, Anguilla australis. 2. A saltwater fish extensively fished commercially, genus Thunnus
    16. mana: A Māori word relating to authority, control, influence, prestige or power.
    17. taonga: Within the Māori world view, a taonga is a treasure that represents whakapapa in relation to a kin group’s estate and tribal resources. Amongst many things, a taonga can be a living creature, a landscape, an object or a song. Taonga are important to the mana (honour and prestige) of the iwi associated with them.
    18. catchment: An area that collects all the water that drains to a particular lake, river or reservoir. Also known as a watershed or a drainage basin.
    19. decline: The gradual and continuous loss of something such as bird numbers or sea ice.
    20. correlation: (Noun) A relationship between two things, for example, doing exercise and your heart rate increasing.
      (Verb) To find a relationship between two things. For example, in geology, correlation involves trying to match rocks or fossils of the same age between different locations.
    21. spawning: The laying of eggs by aquatic animals like fish, frogs, crustaceans or mollusks.
    22. penstock: A gate or intake structure that controls water flow, or an enclosed pipe that delivers water to hydraulic turbines and sewerage systems.
    23. Innovation: The development of a new process or product that is then used by others.
    24. order: A classification grouping that ranks above family and below class (kingdom > phylum > class > order > family > genus > species).
    25. data: The unprocessed information we analyse to gain knowledge.
    26. pressure: The force per unit area that acts on the surface of an object.
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      population

    1. + Create new collection
    2. In biology, a population is a group of organisms of a species that live in the same place at a same time and that can interbreed.

      mātauranga

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    4. Māori cultural knowledge and understanding of the world; Māori wisdom.

      wetland

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    6. An area of land that is saturated with water, often referred to as a swamp or bog. Wetlands may be seasonally or permanently water-logged with vegetation adapted for life under those soil conditions. Wetlands are known as repo in te reo Māori.

      sustainable

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    8. A way of using natural products so they are available for future generations.

      Aotearoa

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    10. The Māori name for New Zealand, meaning Land of the Long White Cloud.

      taonga

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    12. Within the Māori world view, a taonga is a treasure that represents whakapapa in relation to a kin group’s estate and tribal resources. Amongst many things, a taonga can be a living creature, a landscape, an object or a song. Taonga are important to the mana (honour and prestige) of the iwi associated with them.

      spawning

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    14. The laying of eggs by aquatic animals like fish, frogs, crustaceans or mollusks.

      order

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    16. A classification grouping that ranks above family and below class (kingdom > phylum > class > order > family > genus > species).

      iwi

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    18. Māori tribe or large community, often consisting of several hapū (clans) bound together by common ancestors.

      species

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    20. (Abbreviation sp. or spp.) A division used in the Linnean system of classification or taxonomy. A group of living organisms that can interbreed to produce viable offspring.

      decline

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    22. The gradual and continuous loss of something such as bird numbers or sea ice.

      hui

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    24. Māori word for a gathering, meeting or assembly.

      tuna

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    26. 1. A generic Māori word used to describe freshwater eels. There are numerous other specific names that relate to tribal origins and appearance. There are various species of eel, including the longfin eel, Anguilla dieffenbachii and shortfin eel, Anguilla australis. 2. A saltwater fish extensively fished commercially, genus Thunnus

      catchment

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    28. An area that collects all the water that drains to a particular lake, river or reservoir. Also known as a watershed or a drainage basin.

      penstock

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    30. A gate or intake structure that controls water flow, or an enclosed pipe that delivers water to hydraulic turbines and sewerage systems.

      data

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    32. The unprocessed information we analyse to gain knowledge.

      awa

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    34. Māori word for river.

      spawn

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    36. The act of reproduction of aquatic creatures such as fishes, amphibians, crustaceans and mollusks. The mixing of the sperm of a male and the eggs of a female of the species. In mycology, the mycellium of mushrooms.

      elvers

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    38. Juvenile eels.

      habitat

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    40. The natural environment in which an organism lives.

      mana

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    42. A Māori word relating to authority, control, influence, prestige or power.

      correlation

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    44. (Noun) A relationship between two things, for example, doing exercise and your heart rate increasing.
      (Verb) To find a relationship between two things. For example, in geology, correlation involves trying to match rocks or fossils of the same age between different locations.

      Innovation

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    46. The development of a new process or product that is then used by others.

      pressure

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    48. The force per unit area that acts on the surface of an object.