Marine reserve will do nothing for us or hoiho
YOUR article about hoiho (ODT, 8.10.20) finished with two landlubbers looking at the ocean saying we need a marine reserve. I believe research/ observation doesn’t support this.
Blue cod research (Carbines, 1998) in Southland states there is evidence that blue cod move into water up to 120m deep to spawn. The young remain there until they are approximately 200mm long. Hoiho preferred feeding size is below 200mm.
Long Point and surrounds is predominantly below 50m deep, well inside the penguin feeding zone. Hoiho are known to travel up to 25km to feed. All this suggests hoiho will feed well outside a marine reserve.
Go to a health shop and you’ll see red krill oil on the shelves, another food of the hoiho. Plankton and krill are the start of the food chain. By removing krill from the southern ocean, are we affecting the food chain and our coastline?
We have thousands of dollars spent on land purchase, and now a building at Long Point, and very little on ocean research. Are we really about the birds, or the human feelgood factor?
Successive governments have cut research and research facilities.
China has a fishing fleet of 25003000 boats. What will they do to our ocean when they arrive?
I have freedived for paua, looked for crayfish and caught cod at Long Point for over 30 years. I have passed this to my children and I want to pass this on to my grandchildren.
We respect the fishery and above all the hoiho. Unfortunately, a marine reserve will deny us this privilege, and I believe, do little to protect the future of hoiho.
Keith Mcnab
The Catlins
[Abridged]
Tractor protest
A BIG ‘‘well done’’ to the organisers of last week’s Tractor Trek and Town Meets Country hui in Gore and Invercargill.
What an impressive spectacle , seeing around 270 tractors combined at the two events trundling through the streets of the towns — a sight that will last long in the memories of the participants and those that came out to witness it.
Listening to the speakers, they would have been left in no doubt as to how seriously Southland farmers take their responsibility towards freshwater management and the environment.
I am also sure many will understand the frustration farmers feel at the obstacles being placed in front of them, such as the poorly constructed new legislation around freshwater management, and the negative effects this has on their ability to farm responsibly and sustainably.
Well done, farmers.
Craig Tomsett
Kelso
Clean rivers
REGARDING swimmable rivers in New Zealand, what happens when they test the river water?
Is it at the source or halfway down or at the outlet? How far from seagulls’ nesting beaches? After a flood or during? At night or what time of day? Do they analyse for fish and bird poo in the samples? How many tonnes of soil wash out on flat ground per day?
Don Lawrence
Queenstown