KAHAWAI FISHING IN THE WAIAPU RIVER

Te Ao Hou, July 1958, Page 17

KAHAWAI FISHING IN THE WAIAPU RIVER I am collecting short accounts of Maori customs still in existence today. The main reason is to reveal to Maori children these aspects of their Maoritanga. Even if they are not exactly the same as the ancient customs, they are urged to retain knowledge of these remnant customs of their ancestors. The following account deals with Kahawai fishing at the mouth of the Waiapu River in the Ngati Porou district. Rutene Reihana and his wife. Hana, first related the account to me, which was later checked by Tipi Kaa and Kuki Kahaki. Here is an ancient custom observed today by the Rangitukia people. First, is described the sacredness of net making, secondly, the ritual connected with a new net and should be re-cast before any new net is taken into the water, thirdly, the making and types of mesh, fourthly, scaling the fish, fifthly, drying, smoking, preserving. THE construction of a fishing net is a sacred undertaking, and the net would be contaminated by cooked food or by women walking over it. If these precautions are not adhered to, the task of the net-maker becomes difficult and the final product is not satisfactory. There are three types of net. The first is made for December when the three-inch mesh is used. For January the four or four and a half-inch mesh, and for February the five-inch mesh. In December the Kahawai are small in size, hence the three-inch mesh, and in January the fish are a little larger, reaching maximum size generally in February. When the net is complete, a fishing line is threaded through the outside loops of the net. This is known as the “heart of the fishing net”. After this the net is hung up and a weight placed in the bottom of it to help to tighten the mesh ties. Then a length of red manuka pole is fashioned and some supplejacks. These are dried and made into an oval frame according to the size of the net. At this stage the new net is ready to be taken to the beach where it is fixed on to the framework. Before entering the water, the fisherman performs a special rite by urinating on the net and sprinkling some too over his body. Only after this ritual will he enter the water. This ritual is still performed today. When the first fish is caught, the head is broken off so that the blood spills over the net, after which the fish is hung up on a stake well ashore. That particular fish is not eaten. Then one may proceed to fish. Only after performing the above ritual is the tapu of a new net lifted. (With an old net the urination ritual only is performed) Sharks and other destructive creatures of the sea will not enter the net. After having fished the required number, the fish must not be scaled at or near the fishing area. Rather this must be done elsewhere. If scaling is to be done at home, then this must be done outside to avoid contamination by cooked food. Another necessary precaution is that the fisherman is still in the water. If he does not meet with an accident, then he invariably fails to catch any more for the rest of the day. The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals has awarded its Certificate of Merit to a 17-year-old Maori boy, Morris Gray of Darga-ville. At present he is at the Post and Telegraph Department's staff training school, Trentham. Last year in Dargaville where Morris was then a Post Office message boy, he saw a cat obviously in distress up a tall pine tree. He obtained a ladder from the Post Office yard and pursued the cat which had landed itself “out on a limb”. On his approach the cat climbed farther out towards the end of a branch but by perseverence he eventually managed to secure it. The award is jealously guarded and this is one of the few that have been made. ⋆ ⋆ ⋆ Mr W. J. Phillipps, a noted expert in Maori arts and crafts, and well-known to readers of this magazine, has retired from the Dominion Museum, where he had worked since 1918. Trained at the Museum in the years of the late Elsdon Best, Mr Phillipps' most important works have probably those on “Maori Houses and Food Stores” and on “Carved Houses of the Western and Northern Districts of the North Island”. A work on “Old Maori Culture” is about to be published. Mr Phillipps has recently been given a grant by the Maori Purposes Fund Board to enable him to continue his study of carving, to finalize his work on the eastern districts of the North Island.