FISH AND FISHING IN NEW ZEALAND.

North Otago Times, Volume VII, Issue 167, 28 December 1866, Page 2

FISH AND FISHING IN NEW ZEALAND.

"D.M." in " Land and Water," contributes 10m* interesting notei on the above topic. We extract the following :— • The fresh-water fish of New Zealand i» the ubiquitous col, an easy, blunt-nosed, dark-backed species j common size is three to seven pounds. I caught it sixteen, and one caught at my place weighed twenty j it is spoken of as attaining double the but-mentioned weight. In quality it takes the lead in the Maori catalogue, and a great many robust European stomachs sustain it in that reputation. It is never out of season, but when prime it is fat. A large one, skinned, boiled, and presented, answers the touch with a tremor like a mass of warm marrow. I had a Maori servant who knew eeting thoroughly ; he had a way for dressing it from the peculiar " Maori-oven" plan, formerly in universal use by hit race ; without drawing or skinning the eel, he inserted the pointed end of a peeled rod, the thickness of an umbrella handle, into the mouth, and forced it on and out through at the tail. He then wound it all round from head to tail with green flax leaY«s, several pliea over ; two small pieces of stake fixed in position and forked at the upper end received the rod with the eel on between them in place before the fire. The rod formed an axle supported in the forks of th« stakes to turn the fish round on to the fire until done } the entrails were separated when the scorched flax leaves were unwound off. The ordinary mode* of cooking did not gir« anything equal to th« flavor thus obtained. In the North Island, where the Maori population is numerous, eel forms a large and important item of subsistence. Eel weirs (which I did not see, but understood to be modifications of the enures) are largely used in its capture. In the cold of winter, when the eel refuses to b* attracted by bait, my Maori had the following fishing resource. The nearest river had alluvial flats alone* portions of its course, between the bed or channel, and a " terrace-plain" whioh flanked it. Under a thick surface layer, chiefly of loom, the plain had deep strata of rolled shingle or gravel. Along the foot of the terrace formation, where the higher gravel strata abutted on the low flats, copious fountains gushed out and formed into " spring-creeks," running through the flats into the river. The temperature of the spring-creeks in winter was several degrees higher than that of the river, and eels then made migrations from the cold water of the rirer to the milder temperature of the creeks. How my Maori, who was a native of the Chatham Isles, found this out, I do not know, but he had intelligence of it somehow. He turned it to account by running a close fence of stakes driven endwise into the bottom across at the head of a shallow spring-creek pool. The eols congregate in the pool, where their progress was arrested by the fence, buried themselves in numbers there among the mud and roots of the aquatic vegetation. When the Maori wanted fresh fish, he stripped, waded in, JUhed for them with his feet, and used hi» hands on the discoveries made by the feet ; he seized them near the head, and shot them oxpfltlj Mhoro among the grass. Burdens for himself w«re oaptured time after time by this original mode of fishing. In summer he practised with the eel-pot and " bob. 1 * The former is a trap — the principle is well known to lobster fishers. The eel-pot is more durable when made, of withe basket-work. It is more efficient and portable when made of slips of stout tlax-leaf laid on ! a slight skeleton frame of rods, some made into hoop* of graduated sizes, some {laid longitudinally over th* hoops. When made, it is in shape a hollow, bi^bellied spindle, intruncated at both ends, It is baited inside with offal. A bird, or any recent meat or other fish will do (dead eel is not attractive bait). It is ballasted, has one end of a rope (of green flax* leaves knotted one to another) attached, and th* other end fastened ashore, launehed into a pool to r*« main over night, and hauled ashore in the morning. Eels attracted by the bait find the way in, but cannot get out. The principle of the device is th* sam* as in thecruiv**. The most general mode of fishing for eel, in old practice by th* Maoris, and adopted by th* settlers, is the " bob. A hook does not apply. Earthworm for bait, a flax-leaf for line, and a strong elastio stak* for rod, contain the making of this oontrivane*. Earthworm is particularly numerous in New Zealand. In the soil in and around wood, and in the loam n*ar water-courses it abounds. Thick as the little finger, and with length in proportion, it attains in ordinary a size unknown in England. A strip of a flax-leu three-fourths of an inch wide is slit from the top *nd for three to four feet of its length into fine thongs, eight to twelve of them, less or more. The weathered top of the leaf is rigid at the margin | and this forms a stiff sharp point on each thong. By means of it* point, a thong is run readily through a worm length* wise. One large worm or so is run on each thong, and slipped up along to its middle. The two ends of the strip of tlax-leaf are then tied to the small end of the stake, and the worms form the "bob" at the bight of the double-thonged strip of leaf. It is a lump one would suppose big enough to bait for a young shark. The " bob" may be two feet of the flax-leaf line from the top of the rod or stake ; and the stake may be long or short, according to fancy, or the height of the bank fished from. The early part of a warm cloudy night is the most favourable. The top end of the stake as well as th* " bob" is slipped down into the water, the rest generally on the bottom. You then sit and wait. If you think of something else, a big eel may come and " walk away" with the whole apotheo. If he is for it, he does not nibble, but tugs like a mastiff ; nor docs he offer to let go to save himself from being pulled ashore, although there is no hook. Er*n when landed he often holds on until the foot on his neck induces him to let go. A hook is not only super* fluous, but would be of great inconvenience $ it would take such a fight to extricate it. When a liv* hooked eel is seized in the hand to get the hook separated, he has th* extraordinary ingenuity to double the body, form a knot on it by putting the tail round in through the loop, and, closing this knot tight, draw the upper portion of the body and head back through it by a powerful muscular effort, which wrenches himioos* away from the hand. It is some* times a kind of double knot, as if that gave an men*** of power. In this, a double coil of the body i* formed before th* tail to mak* it a knot » in**rt*d

through. It would not seem that this remarkable expedient Of the dumb creature has attracted bo muoh attention as its peculiar sagacity deserves. It is wellknown, however, to boys in the Highlands, who, on catching small eels (not generally eaten in that part of the country), and holding the fish by the head until it liberates itself by means of the knot, amuse themselves while rythmically repeating to it this ditty :— " Easgan ! Easean ! Cur snaim a bnraibpoar, 'S lepgaidh mi as thu." That in :— "Eel! Eel! Perform the weaver's knot, And I'll let thee go." ■From the manner in which the bait is put on in _4&e " bob," tho same bait serves out the night's expedition without renewal. The large size of fish captured iu New Zealand lands some excitement to this more utilitarian than romantic sport. I was wai seldom attracted by it. On my second night's eeling, I caught one with a duckling of the wild breed, rather larger than a man's fist in its stomach. Previously, but on the same day, I saw a dead duckling floating in the edge of the -water at the tail of the same pool, so I have no reason to suppose that the eel had killed it.