Have we killed the Golden Goose

An Opinion Piece by Rex N. Gibson

“The Goose that Laid the Golden Eggs” is one of the Aesop’s Fables, a story that also has a number of Eastern analogues going back over a millennium. The English idiom “Kill not the goose that lays the golden egg”, derives from this fable. It is generally used for a short-sighted action that destroys the profitability of an asset. Caxton’s old English version of the story has the goose’s owner demand that it lay two eggs a day; when it replied that it could not, the owner killed it.

Is this precisely what has happened to New Zealand’s wild salmon fishery? Scratch any old angler’s memory and you will find tales of twenty, thirty and even forty pound salmon. Fishing equipment stores and some hotels have the taxidermists’ efforts showing such magnificent wild fish on their walls. In days gone by the resource was plundered. Once the limit was ten fish per day. I can recall walking up and down the neighbouring streets in the late 1950s trying to give away surplus salmon, nearly as big as me, that Grandad had caught. Nobody had freezers then and the daily limit was six fish. Grandma had reached the end of her bottling capability and capacity.

L: The good old days.                                                         R: Rakaia catch

In the 1990s the salmon anglers’ Eldorado had its second coming. The limit was down to two a day. I had once gone to the Rakaia Mouth (south side). We shuffled down the spit in waders and cast our lures at 7 a.m. one February morning. By 8 a.m. I was sitting on the bank eating me pre-cut brunch with two twenty pound salmon sitting in my sugar bag. My mate had caught a kahawai and was still flogging the water. It was 10 a.m. before he had his two on the bank. This was in the days before cell phones that acted as cameras. We would have made a great photograph as we wandered back. My mate had found a long driftwood branch. We threaded all five fish onto it through the gills and mouth. With him at the front and me at the rear we hoisted the branch onto our shoulders and slipped and stepped our way back along the kilometre of the shifting wet stones to the car park with our 80 pounds of fish. There would have been over sixty anglers there that morning. Few, if any, went home “fishless”. The run of salmon lasted for weeks as did the plundering. The small fish under about eight pounds were often thrown back as the anglers sought something “more respectable”. Some anglers returned daily for their two fish each time.

As salmon declined after about 1998, every year produced a new explanation from F&G and the local angling soothsayers. Over the next few years it became clear that nobody really knew. When you cannot pinpoint a single cause the natural response is to blame a cocktail of causes. The scatter gun approach with the hope that one of them is right. For some the correlation even strongly shows a link with the growth of dairy in the relevant catchments. Numerous factors were seen to be “causes”; quantity of abstraction, timing of abstractions, hopelessly inefficient fish screens, cattle browsing activity in spawning streams, by-catch at sea, the harvesting of krill and squid, climate change and the resulting increases in sea temperatures, Glyphosate use in river beds, Agri-chemical residues killing plankton and thus smolt, the increase in seal predation, etc. Throw in the near disappearance of smelt and silveries from Canterbury estuaries and you can see what I mean about the cocktail of causes. I was surprised that the astrology, alignment of planets, and the earth’s magnetic field were not included in the list. The Rakaia and Waimakariri annual salmon fishing competitions saw hundreds of fish submitted in the quest for extravagant prizes until the last few years. Last year no salmon were caught in the Waimakariri competition. Although 48 were caught over the three days at 2024 Rakaia competition the heaviest was just 7.3 lbs (3.32 kg). I was heavier than that at birth! Compare that with the photo below (left) previously published in The Fishing Mag of a forty one pound fish and the other of a very early 1900s Waitaki salmon.

Although the Chinook (King or Quinnat) salmon were first introduced to the Waitaki in 1901 that was first river to lose most of its run when the first Waitaki dam went up in 1929. That reduced the Waitaki population by 90% but anglers still prospered as the fish spread to rivers as far north as Marlborough. Further release on the West Coast and Otago boosted interest in salmon angling.

While hydro dams and migrating fish do not go together, neither do many farming practices and salmon spawning in key back country waters. The Rakaia and Waimakariri catchments have been particulartly damaged by land use practices and agri-chemical influences. The Rangitata has been the most devastated by abstraction of water for irrigation, closely followed by the Rakaia. Lower water levels lead to higher river temperatures which deter the migration of salmon. The fishery decline has prompted the use of a $450K MacInyre bequest, and more supplementary funding,  by North Canterbury F&G to save/improve just one spawning stream; the Glenariffe. 

For a couple of decades salmon caught as by-catch at sea was a major issue; with inshore commercial fishers benefitting. The excuses from those with vested interests would fill an encyclopedia but concerted effort by concerned anglers has significantly reduced this. But were there effots too late anyway?

Male Chinook –                                                            Female Chinook

Male will look more silvery if caught at the river mouth.

A few years back I published an article entitled 1001 theories on salmon fishing. At the time I hoped that science would provide solutions to the massive decline in this fishery. Sadly I think that science, or at least its scientists, has failed us.

In recent years the salmon limit has gone from two per day to two per season but I suspect the horse, or at least the salmon, had already bolted. F&G have worked on the assumption that the genetics of farmed salmon released into natural waterways was the fifth column in the war to save the fishery. The complete cessation of farmed salmon releases, or even fertilized ova stripped from wild fish, hasn’t done anything to halt the decline. It’s not only a decline in the number and size of salmon, but the number of anglers, that’s disappointing.

Kahawai were once thrown back by most salmon anglers. Disdain and expletives filled the air when one was caught. Now they are almost prized and many more are kept. It’s the new main angling sport at river mouths. No licence is needed. The beautiful orange Omega 3, Vitamin D and protein laden fish oils of salmon go begging. The key question still is “Why are kahawai thriving and salmon declining?” The numbers fluctuate but over the last six or more years they have usually been very good. Do excuses such as the reduction of suitable food and predation at sea stack up?

The temperature change reason seems to be the only suggestion that draws universal acceptance. If wild stock have not recovered after the 6 years of the current ‘no hatchery fish’ programme then perhaps it is time to go back to restocking and enhancing the rivers with fertilized ova planting and smolt releases. Six years equates to two salmon life cycles.

NZ Salmon Anglers ‘planting’ fertilized ova in a spawning stream (Larry Burke – photo)

We currently pay five dollars for a salmon licence/endorsement. I would pay $25 or more if my chances of catching a salmon increased significantly (if the levy went soley to salmon enhancement). The hatchery raised, and fertilized ova transplanted, salmon that have gone feral are fine with me and I am convinced most of my river bank aquaitances share this feeling. Although the genetic purists can point to overseas evidence of genetic contamination effects, all of our salmon are from the same parental stock that were first liberated in the Hakataramea in the early 1900s. That original gene pool was tiny to start with. I accept that the fish farmers are now selectively breeding for their needs. There is no reason why we cannot do the same with wild stock eggs – as was done in the past; especially at Glenariffe Research Station. They supplied fertilized eggs and smolt to various F&G regions for decades.

Glenariffe Research Station – Both photos from fishingmag.co.nz

The excitement of landing a salmon in one of Canterbury’s wild, wide rivers is, as a female fishing colleague of mine often says, the most fun that you can have with your waders on. The ‘wild-spawned fish only’ advocates have had their chance. Fish numbers, and especially fish size, have continued to decline. Hatchery raised fish are the basis of the hydro canal fishery so why cannot we enjoying catching their cousins in a more natural river environment than the sterile banks of a canal. Let’s reconsider both the partnership with the enthusiastic volunteers of NZ Salmon Anglers Association (with their ova-planting scotty boxes), and the Kaiapoi Silverstream smolt releases etc. We have waited long enough for the genetic purity advocates to succeed. All we are doing now is to increase salmon anglers petrol bills and promoting Twizel’s tourism industry, etc., as anglers trip off to the Mackenzie Country. I am regularly meeting disappointed anglers who no longer buy a licence; salmon were all that they fished for.

A fishing retailer tells me that many former salmon anglers now focus on surf casting helped by the increasing marine species composition along our coast. Their sales of surf rods reflect that. A key role of F&G is to provide freshwater angling opportunities for licence holders and Chinook are the gold medal of fresh water angling achievement. Have F&G’s practices enhanced this? Lets create opportunities to catch salmon even if it becomes a glorified ‘put and take’ fishery in the eyes of some genetic purists. Even Cawthron scientists in their 2020 letter to North Canterbury Fish and Game stated:

If hatchery operations are undertaken at a vast scale they can produce good returns for anglers— albeit at the expense of the wild-run component of a fishery.

That wild-run component is terminally ill. The Montrose hatchery that succeeded Glenariffe on the Rakaia was not a success. That does not mean that the concept is wrong; only its execution at Montrose. Is it possible that failing to find a viable replacement was a case of “killing the Golden Goose?”

L: canal salmon                                                           R: Upcountry wild salmon

I refer genetic purists to Mike Field-Dodgson‘s article of 2024 in Fishingmag.co.nz https://fishingmag.co.nz/salmon-fishing-in-new-zealands-south-island-where-how-when-to-catch-salmon-salmon-rods-reels-videos-methods-places/hatchery-reared-salmon

Mike’s article should be compulsary reading for all anglers. He was involved as a fisheries scientist with MAF since 1975. A worthwhile quote from the article is:

“OK, bolstering the wild run with hatchery smolt is expensive, but it does work. I mean ask the people at Silverstream hatchery what percentage of fish returning there have no adipose fin – you will get a shock!

So then we get the balmy policy from Fish and Game that it is better to rely on the wild run with pure genetics to further develop the salmon fishery – hatchery releases are unsound and pollute the genetic base.

I don’t know where this dopey idea came from but it is ridiculous for anyone to think that relying on the wild run will get the salmon fishery back to the glory days. I guess this is an example of passive management…….Oh, I forgot……..they were allowed to plant eggs and release Smolt but only in areas where salmon had never been……a bit like releasing polar bears in the tropics…….”

It may well be that the wild salmon fishery is screwed anyway. The recent and current legal battles over water abstraction in the salmon’s main rivers show probable causes. Science has a role in fishery amangement. F&G Councils receive advice that is “pure science” which looks at the overseas evidence. “Applied science” is needed to come up with solutions that give licence holders the sport they have paid for in their licence and will pay for again if we save ‘the goose’). A left field consideration would be to consider releases of sock-eyes (ex Lake Benmore) into the lower Waimakariri or Kaiapoi Rivers. The catching techniques are improving at a steady pace. Salmon fishery enhancement has happenned ever since Hakataramea’s hatchery opened 120+ years ago. It is not some new evil. It is a reality for a species that is struggling in a habitat 11,000 km and a hemisphere away from its native home. It would be very sad if future angling historians look back and say that “genetics purists” killed the Golden Goose.

Rex N Gibson

Just for the record I have a M.Sc (Distinction) in Parasitology and Vertebrate Ecology. I understand the biological implications of my proposals so I don’t dismiss the current “pure” science lightly.