EEL SITE SAVED

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 33093, 7 December 1972, Page 2

EEL SITE SAVED

(N.Z. Press Association) NELSON, Dec. 6. The tame eels of Anatold, near Takaka, have been preserved as a tourist attraction by a community effort. Last month Miss Fiona McCallum, who has fed and displayed the eels for 11 years, said she would have to give up because heavy flooding in the winter had eroded the access to them and destroyed their home. Nearby farmers and friends with machinery, timber, and equipment

came to her aid last weekend, built a stand by the side of the Anatoki River and good access to it from the adjacent road, and established a new feeding site. Miss McCallum said today that the eels had accepted their new feeding place without hesitation and she was ready to feed them for any visitors. Eels have been fed by the McCallum family since 1918 when Miss Maggie McCallum, a sister of Miss Fiona McCallum, started the attraction. Since then, thousands of people, including tourists from over-

seas, have seen the eels called for feeding by fingers flicked in the water or a couple of stones being tapped together in the river. The eels come to the riverbank for feeding with small bits of household food given them either on a spoon or a stick. They thrust their heads from the water for attention and writhe under and over one another in mass in their eagerness for food. They can be stroked by the venturesome and are not slimy when unafraid. Their skins feel like soft, wet velvet