MPI to launch $8m review of snapper numbers off east coast

Saturday, 2 September 2017

Experts from various fishing sectors have welcomed an $8 million review of New Zealand's largest recreational fishery, Snapper One.

However, some believe radical changes and bolder decision makers are needed to make any significant difference in the depleting stock numbers of snapper.

The Ministry for Primary Industries plans to review snapper numbers over the next three years by electronically tagging 100,000 of the fish.

The review, which is likely to begin this summer, will cover Snapper One, an area of the east coast between North Cape, 30 kilometres east of Cape Reinga, and Cape Runaway, 90km northeast off Whakatane, out to a distance of 370km. Tags the size of rice grains will be inserted into snappers' gut cavities.  

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The last snapper tagging review in Snapper One was undertaken in 1993. 

Auckland marine biologist Roger Grace said more information about snapper is needed.

'More understanding of snapper is a pretty important thing, but there are already things we know we can do to improve the snapper situation, which is pretty dire in Snapper One.

'With snapper stock at 10 per cent, that's pretty pathetic, that's when you should be closing the fishery,' Dr Grace said.

Snapper is not only a favourite commercial and recreational catch, but has a key role in the eco-system, he said. Both snapper and crayfish, which are severely depleted, keep kina numbers down.

Without adequate numbers of snapper and crayfish, kina have destroyed the kelp forests and marine habitats on shallow reefs throughout the Snapper One area over the past 30 years, Grace said.

'What we need in the Hauraki Gulf is a good network of marine reserves, because only marine reserves will restore the full-size range of snapper and allow the reef ecology to recover,' he said. 

Waiheke Local Board chairperson Paul Walden said it was worrying that the snapper research is being carried out by the Ministry of Primary Industries, which is 'primarily concerned about catching fish', rather than the Department of Conservation.

'There's no way this research is going to wind up with areas of the gulf that are conserved, and that's really important,' Walden said.

'We've got 30 per cent of our terrestrial country in conservation estates, we've got lots of indigenous bird species that it's illegal to kill, yet we've got this free for all happening at sea.'

Both Walden and Grace suggested 10 per cent of New Zealand waters should be protected in marine reserves opposed to the less than one per cent that is currently protected.

The New Zealand Initiative's Dr Randall Bess said a lot of money went into the Snapper One management plan which was developed a few years ago but warned: 'the plan is essentially going nowhere'.

'Not much is being done to improve the status of the snapper stock. The management plan has very noble targets of doubling the biomass in 25 years but doesn't include any steps for actually doing this,' said Bess.

The daily bag limit reduced from 30 snapper in 1985 to the current limit of seven snapper set in 2014 while the legal size limit had increased from 27 centimetres to 30 centimetres.

Bess also expressed concern about the 'large number' of snapper that are smaller than 30-centimetres and thrown back into the ocean.

'People are misguided in thinking if a fish swims away it lives. Most of them probably die,' said Bess.

Nigel Boland, who runs a Waiheke Island fishing charter boat, agreed and said many undersized fish that are hooked and thrown back die.

'More fish are dying now to meet that 30 centimetre limit than died before.'

But he said tagging snapper to get a better idea of numbers was probably a good idea.

However, Boland was concerned the review could be undermined by recreational fishers catching tagged fish and not reporting it.

The initial results of the review are expected by 2019 or 2020, and the final results in 2022.