Anglers criticise nitrate controls
Canterbury Regional Council (ECan) has been accused of creating a monster it can no longer control when it comes to degraded water quality.
The Federation of Freshwater Anglers been testing Selwyn River and found nitrates have increased by up to 50 per cent in 22 months.
Its president and longtime angler Peter Trolove says people can no longer swim in a river that, before World War II, was considered “one of the top half dozen trout fisheries in the dominion”.
“They had fish counts of over 200,000 trout going up the river, and it’s fallen to, well, I don’t know if they find any now.”
He blamed the regional council’s decision to allow intensive dairy farming across the plains.
Trolove described the nitrate from cow urine as a genie that was hard to put back in its bottle.
“I know and the council know that we don’t have the means to restore these degraded rivers. We’ve got all the documents in the world. We’ve got farm environment plans, but we’ve set up a monster that we can’t do anything about.”
Trolove pointed to the maximum nitrate level (6.8 milligrams per litre of water) set by the local water zone committee, saying it gave farmers the right to continue polluting at current levels for years to come.
The council’s director of science Tim Davie said this level was struck in consultation with the community.
“So it’s never a pure science decision. It’s a mixture of what is achievable because actually under the Resource Management Act, it has to be achievable, which means farmers have to be able to adapt.
“You ask is it a mistake? I don’t think it’s a mistake. I think what it has done is put us on the pathway towards change”.
Davie had no doubt nitrate levels in the Selwyn had increased but said the level of pollution was most likely the result of farming practices 30 years ago, as nitrates slowly made their way through the soils.
A plateauing of cow numbers and 35 per cent reduction in nitrate losses from dairy farms meant pollution levels would likely decrease after a decade, he said.