WHITEBAIT CAMP

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26774, 18 May 1948, Page 4

WHITEBAIT CAMP

TWO-WAY RADIO AVAILABLE LINK WITH OUTSIDE WORLD Special Reporter QUEENSTOWN, May 17. In order to obviate the possibility of the men at the whitebait camp at Big Bay, on the West Coast, losing contact with the outside world, radio transmitting and receiving equipment is to be installed at their camp before the opening of the whitebait season. It will be recalled that last season, when one of the aircraft being used to transport whitebait from the camp was forced down in the Lammerla\ys, the men at Big Bay were left without a line of communication. Bad weather prevented other aircraft from reaching the camp with supplies, and the whitebaiters were reduced to a fish and venison diet and to smoking coffee. Being without a radio, they had no idea what might have happened to their air link and when a plane finally reached the camp the men were contemplating making the long trek over exceptionally rugged country from the coast.

The radio equipment is already at Frankton airfield and will be flown to Big Bay within a few weeks, as the camp will be set up before the opening of the whitebait season on August 1. An Alexandra resident has an in- * tergst other than gastronomic in whitebait. Intrigued by conflicting stories concerning the ultimate physical shape of the fish, he has a “ tame ” whitebait —the sole survivor of several—living in a tin of water at his home. Heavy frosts have necessitated thawing the small fish out on recent mornings. So far, this amateur research has gone unrewarded—the whitebait still looks the same as any’ whitebait, and is presumably as harassed as any fish would be in the circumstances.