Fishermen tow the line

Observance of blue cod regulations remains a concern but the Ministry of Primary Industries says it is pleased with the level of recreational fishing compliance in the top of the south this summer.

Chief compliance officer for Nelson-Marlborough Anthony Little said while windy weather had reduced the amount of fishing activity overall, MPI had been heavily engaged in monitoring catches around the region.

‘‘We’ve got people working everyday and that will continue until the weather changes – when the weather’s right people will be out and we need to be out as well,’’ he said.

Although data from the traditionally busy Nelson Anniversary and Waitangi weekends was still being collated, compliance officers had so far reported an overall 90 per cent compliance rate, with Nelson and Golden Bay in particular providing few problems.

‘‘There’s been some good catches but again it’s been a bit hit and miss with the weather – on the whole leading up to Christmas people were doing really well with snapper and we weren’t finding too many offences at all,’’ he said.

While excess or undersized issues had not been prevalent in Tasman Bay, one area of note had been occasional oversights regarding marking of nets and set line equipment.

‘‘They’re there for safety reasons and for people to find them if they get blown away and also for us so we can determine how many nets or set lines each set line each individual has if they’re marked properly because you’re only allowed one of each.’’

In the Marlborough Sounds, officers had been kept busy with breaches of blue cod and paua regulations

‘‘Blue cod has been our biggest [problem] over the summer for sure – that’s mainly to do with undersized blue cod and there has been a few excess.’’

Overall, Little said that more than 50 notices had been handed out across the top of the south during the summer period.

Half of those had been for blue cod-related offences.

‘‘There hasn’t been any serious offending – more than three times over is what we class as serious offending.’’

‘‘There is sort of an attitude that close enough is good enough, and that’s something that we’re trying to encourage people that it is not,’’ Little said.

Rules state that each fisherman is allowed to catch two blue cod a day, which must be at least 33 centimetres in length, and cannot be filleted so they can be measured accurately.

The outer Sounds area was closed to recreational fishermen from September 1 to December 20 each year.

A daily maximum of 10 paua can be taken per fisher.

In order to rebuild the blue cod fishery, Little said MPI would be taking ‘‘a pretty hard line’’ in terms of undersized fish to encourage vigilance among when accurately measuring their catches.

‘‘[Having] a [measuring] sticker on the side of the boat doesn’t help, it needs to be on a flat surface with an edge that you can put the nose up against, particularly if we’re talking less than a centimetre – 32.3cm is not 33cm, so we’re reminding people of that.

‘‘If this doesn’t work, the next steps aren’t that good in terms of fishing for blue cod so it’s about everyone trying to do their bit and taking ownership for their fishing,’’ he said. After nine days’ chamber music heaven the finale surpassed its own high reputation with a rich, hugely satisfying programme of contrasts that combined to create consummate musical perfection.

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