News

Electrofishing

By Tamara Ramage

From 11-13 April 2022, we were privileged to have Richard Allibone from Water Ways Consulting, who facilitated the three days of electrofishing and taught our tauira some amazing new skills.

The tauira started their mornings at O Te Ika Rama Marae participating in fish ID training, followed by investigating waterways in the area, and allowing them to learn how to use and manage the electrofishing equipment. They learnt how to adjust and set the voltage for the equipment and then they were ready to go!

According to Raniera Smyth and Kaloni Taylor the safest way to use the specialised equipment is for the person in charge to ensure they are aware of where everyone is situated before using it, and to call out fishing before operating the equipment to allow others to move to a safe distance and out of the vicinity of water where the equipment will be used.Raniera Smyth and Josiah Kawana electrofishing.

On Tuesday, the tauira went to a little island above the Mataura River falls and to Gore, where they continued to investigate below the bridge. While here, they caught two juvenile kanakana (ammocoetes) ready for migration out to sea where they would lay their eggs, which explains why they are a beautiful bright blue colour. As Sentre Harden pointed out, when they come back to freshwater if they settle in dirty or muddy parts of the river, this can cause them to change from blue to brown. Also, on the same day a Torrentfish which is quite rare and can usually be found in rapids or fast flowing waters, was caught by two lucky tauira, Sentre and Kaloni.

Wednesday saw all parties go out to Waikawa for coastal electrofishing. This is where the tauira encountered numerous, smaller, shallow streams where they investigated and found mainly Redfin Bullies and Banded Kōkopu, which is found in the Catlins.

Raniera learnt that if you do not use the equipment correctly in terms of Cockabullies it can cause them to get a black strip across their back if left in the water for too long. Rogan Marsh explained that the longest the electro equipment can be left in the water, is five seconds, followed by a three second break and then a finally five seconds while moving the electro current into different sections of the water.Redfin Bullie.

While Raniera continued to explain that one person will electroshock the water and another person will move behind this person with a small net, moving fish in a sweeping motion to another person who is behind with a larger net, who lifts and collects the fish for investigation into buckets. Once fish were moved to the bucket Kaloni Taylor said that the fish became aware and would move around normally.

Concluding the three-day event, the tauira were accredited with a certificate for completing their three-day training.

A huge congratulations to all tauira and supporting parties for another big accomplishment, onward and upward!

Posted: 10 May 2022

Tuna surveying

By Tegan Ramage

The tauira, along with facilitator Matt Dale, set hīnaki in multiple areas stretching from the Mataura Mātaitai through to Wyndham and Edendale, where they caught tuna to investigate. The tauira said that they caught both Perch and Tuna on the day.Kaloni Taylor releasing tuna after surveying.

There were two separate buckets, one was a mix of water and clove oil, which was used to sedate the tuna, so they were easier to handle.

The tauira estimated that they had caught, measured, and weighed around 300 tuna.

Josh Aitkens said that for the larger tuna, two people are required, one to support its head and the other person to support its spine. After the tuna were weighed and measured, they were then placed into a second bucket, where they were able to readjust before releasing.

In terms of water safety, Sentre Harden shared that they were to walk up stream and then based on your size and weight would determine how a person would cross. Sentre shared that he was to walk across the river on a diagonal, in comparison to Kaloni Taylor who shared that he felt like he had an advantage, because based on his size he was able to go straight across the river, set the hīnaki and retrieve the hīnaki first in comparison to the others in the group.

The tauira were taught pawhara, known as the cleaning and preparing of tuna, and Vincent Leith directed this process.

Kaloni Taylor said that he enjoyed setting the hīnaki and the highlight for all the tauira present was eating them (tuna).

Josh Aitkens shared that a highlight for him was catching the biggest tuna on the day.

Posted: 10 May 2022

Minister Jackson visits Hokonui Rūnanga

By Tegan Ramage

On Wednesday 27 April, we were very lucky to have the Minister for Māori Development Willie Jackson join us at the Hokonui Rūnanga with his amazing Te Puni Kōkiri team.

Group photo of tauira, staff, Minister Willie Jackson, Dr Liz Craig, and Te Puni Kōkiri colleagues.

During their visit, the Hokonui Rūnanga Taiao team presented the different projects happening in partnership with Toitῡ te Whenua (Land Information New Zealand) and other funders. This presentation spoke to capacity building, the Hokonui Hill biodiversity kaupapa, the Kaitiaki Whenua programme and seed collection.

Abby-Lee Evans presented the outcomes and future aspirations for the tauira of the Kaitiaki Whenua programme, while sharing experiences that would not only benefit the tauira Presentation from Abby-Lee Evans about the Kaitiaki Whenua project.educationally, but also their wellbeing and individual growth. This was then reinforced by Raniera Smyth who spoke about his experiences in the programme. He shared his experiences as the team leader and he believed that the programme was helping him to develop necessary skills for work and for them individually. He continued to share how everyone was like whānau and he felt very supported, by his peers and facilitators. His experiences have helped him to grow and develop a definite pathway for himself.

Other presenters for the evening were Riki Parata, who spoke to the other important environmental projects while Ivan Hodgetts and Terry Nicholas spoke to the Murihiku Regeneration Riki Parata gave an overview of all other projects within Te Taiao Department.Projects which involve developing educational programmes to encourage positive transitions for rangatahi from education into work or into higher educational settings. Terry Nicholas spoke to the six key priorities of the project and what this will look like for iwi, including up to date progress and where to next.

The evening finished in the dining room with kai and kōrero about projects happening in and around Hokonui. It was great to hear the conversations of our tauira with the Minister and his colleagues about their journey and where they hope to be when they graduate from the programme. We are so very proud of all the tauira who were there and shared their experiences and thank you to all the staff, Minister Jackson and colleagues for being a part of such awesome kōrero.

Posted: 4 May 2022

Minister Jackson visits Hokonui Rūnanga

By Tegan Ramage (Hokonui Rūnanga)

On Wednesday 27 April 2022, we were very lucky to have the Minister for Māori Development Willie Jackson join us at the Hokonui Rūnanga with his amazing Te Puni Kōkiri team.Group photo of tauira, staff, Minister Willie Jackson, Dr Liz Craig, and Te Puni Kōkiri colleagues.Abby-Lee Evans gave a presentation about the Kaitiaki Whenua programme.

During their visit, the Hokonui Rūnanga Taiao team presented the different projects happening in partnership with Toitῡ te Whenua (Land Information New Zealand) and other funders. This presentation spoke to capacity building, the Hokonui Hill biodiversity kaupapa, the Kaitiaki Whenua programme and seed collection.

Abby-Lee Evans presented the outcomes and future aspirations for the tauira of the Kaitiaki Whenua programme, while sharing experiences that would not only benefit the tauira educationally, but also their wellbeing and individual growth.

Tauira (Raniera Smyth) sharing experiences about the Kaitiaki Taiao Tauira Programme.

This was then reinforced by Raniera Smyth who spoke about his experiences in the programme. He shared his experiences as the team leader and he believed that the programme was helping him to develop necessary skills for work and for them individually. He continued to share how everyone was like whānau and he felt very supported, by his peers and facilitators. His experiences have helped him to grow and develop a definite pathway for himself.

Riki Parata gave an overview of projects within Te Taiao Department.

Other presenters for the evening were Riki Parata, who spoke to the other important environmental projects while Ivan Hodgetts and Terry Nicholas spoke to the Murihiku Regeneration Projects which involve developing educational programmes to encourage positive transitions for rangatahi from education into work or into higher educational settings. Terry Nicholas spoke to the six key priorities of the project and what this will look like for iwi, including up to date progress and where to next.

Ivan Hodgetts spoke to the education and training Murihiku Regeneration projects.

The evening finished in the dining room with kai and kōrero about projects happening in and around Hokonui. It was great to hear the conversations of our tauira with the Minister and his colleagues about their journey and where they hope to be when they graduate from the programme. We are so very proud of all the tauira who were there and shared their experiences and thank you to all the staff, Minister Jackson and colleagues for being a part of such awesome kōrero.Terry Nicholas spoke to the Murihiku Regeneration projects - providing a more general overview.

Posted: 4 May 2022

Murihiku and Aotearoa energy leaders meet to develop Renewable Energy Plan

On 28 April 2022, Murihiku Regeneration hosted a half day workshop at the Great South offices - with local, regional and national energy leaders to continue with the process of developing a Renewable Energy Work Plan that can be presented to government and also the Murihiku Hapū later in 2022. Murihiku Regeneration has responsibility for both the Clean Energy and Worker Transitions workstreams.Attendees at the Clean Energy workshop on Thursday 28 April.

Murihiku Regeneration was also well represented at the workshop by Terry Nicholas (Hokonui Rūnanga) and Dion Williams (Te Rūnaka o Awarua).

From an Iwi perspective, Dion Williams was very keen to ensure, ”that any actions recommended supported social infrastructure, with good community and whanau buy-in to support the introduction of new energy opportunities like green hydrogen”.

The purpose of the working group is to identify actionable new industries, identify opportunities around new energy generation and enable smaller supporting industries and amplifying technologies for the region that can be implemented in the near term.

During the workshop – presentations from expert members of the group – including Ross Copland (CEO NZ Infrastructure Commission), Dr Regina Eisert (Marine Energy), Anna Kominik (Edmund Hilary Fellowship) and Steve Canny (Great South) provided context around how they thought the Murihiku-Southland renewable energy ecosystem the potential goals, framework and priority projects should be considered.

Independent Chair, Eric Roy said, “I felt the group provided some really useful insights and contributions that need to be further developed to make them credible, actionable and support the region to embrace renewable energy and the opportunities it will bring to the whole community”.

The group is due to report back into the Just Transitions programme in late June, and to provide a final report in late August 2022.

Posted: 3 May 2022