“Mighty” Rakaia River is Vanishing Due to Neglect

by Tony Orman

Canterbury’s Rakaia River, once the premier sport fishing river for quinnat salmon is vanishing before the eyes of recreational anglers as irrigation dwindle its once strong flows and high nitrate levels, largely from burgeoning corporate dairying, contaminate aquifers and ecologically poison the freshwater ecosystem.

Paul Hodgson of Christchurch in Canterbury, is one such longtime angler who has seen the degradation but he’s now angry after seeing a recent television news item showing government’s Minister for Hunting and Fishing James Meager and Fish and Game patron and celebrity Lynda Topp at Rakaia gorge discussing a new family licence setup.

“They seemed utterly oblivious to the Rakaia River’s ecological crisis and the decline in the public’s recreational fishery,” said Paul. “Instead of addressing these critical issues, the video diverted people’s attention away from these concerns and undermined efforts to protect the river by only focusing on improving human and gender diversity among anglers.”

It’s not as though Lynda Topp and the Hunting and Fishing minister James Meager would have been unaware of the dire situation. A few days before Canterbury fish veterinarian and long-time angler Dr. Peter Trolove publicly warned that the river’s fish numbers had declined alarmingly due to the ecological collapse in turn due to large scale irrigation for intensive dairying in the low rainfall region.

Intimate Knowledge

Like Peter Trolove, Paul Hodgson has fished the Rakaia River for decades and knows its fishery and wildlife intimately.

“Over a decade-long salmon study in Canterbury, even when angler catch rates were reduced by as much as 40%, there was no significant improvement in the number of salmon returning to spawn. This suggests that the primary reason for the salmon’s decline isn’t how many are being caught by anglers, but deeper issues that create constraints for the river, its ecosystem and the salmon fishery need to be identified and mitigated.”

In an open letter to Minister Meager Paul Hodgson called on the Member for Rangitata electorate of Parliament to correct the wrong impression by admitting and identifying the crisis.

“You now need to make good on this mistake for the sake of the river and the world class trout and salmon fishery it used to be, by highlighting the crisis. The messaging conveyed from the video was that there are no issues when fishing on the mighty Rakaia River, apart from human diversity, and this needs to be promptly corrected.”

He also targeted North Canterbury Fish and Game for its negligence.

“Relying only on the current two-salmon-per-season bag limit is pushing the fishery even closer to collapse,” he said. “This policy doesn’t tackle the underlying problems and, in fact, often results in anglers targeting the largest and most important spawning fish—the very fish needed for population recovery. Making matters worse, there’s no genetic stock available to help stop the decline of spawning numbers and then enhance the fishery in the future available to Fish and Game.”

Just a Trickle

The flow of the once “mighty Rakaia River” has been reduced to a comparative trickle, due to irrigation draw-offs. 

The Rakaia River’s flow has declined to such an extent that anglers can now carefully drive 4WD’s across it with increasing frequency and jet boats become stranded due to lowering water levels  during the day as irrigation kicks in.

Paul Hodgson said other management approaches that could help restore the salmon fishery are available and some have been proposed. 

“But unfortunately, the North Canterbury Fish and Game Council has consistently blocked these options in recent years, mainly due to ideological reasons, rather than scientific or practical considerations.”

Mirroring the collapsed salmon fishery, a once renowned sea trout fishery in the Rakaia and other rivers has declined to be almost non-existent, 

“The crisis affecting the Rakaia River’s trout populations now closely matches the severe decline already seen in the salmon fishery, as well as the broader east coast trout fisheries of Canterbury,” he said.

Footnote: (1) Both the Rakaia and Rangitata Rivers are protected by Water Conservation Orders, a protection akin to National Park status.

(2) Paul Hodgson has fished, since the early seventies in the Rakaia River and has served on the North Canterbury Fish and Game Council, the national body Fish and Game NZ and is the President of the NZ Salmon Anglers Association.

Photo below:- Paul Hodgson writes:- “My dad left me a fantastic salmon fishery with fabulous memories but is the future of the salmon fishery going to be consigned by inaction, to photo albums and and folklore of angler oral histories?