Following the ‘Daily Report” yesterday – criticising dirty dairying practices continuing on the Wanganui River – TRM received the following letter ( and we didn’t pay him anything at all, not even a bottle of plonk, and he has not even stayed at TRM) :
I enjoyed your extract on the dairy farming issue affecting South Island fisheries. However, before advocating too strongly for a similar clean up in the Taupo region consider the statement in a previous post on your website that the waters in lake Taupo are nutrient poor, leading to malnourished smelt and smaller trout.
“What was a real surprise to me was learning that for most of the time the lake’s smelt population is starving, owing to the low level of nutrients in the clear lake water. To get a handle on this, one only needs to look at the size of the smelt in some Rotorua lakes. There, the smelt grow to twice the size of their Taupo cousins in what can best described as a ‘nutrient soup’.”
I am a scientist with some marine biology training and not at all connected with the dairy industry. It is just important to note that cleaner might not always be better for the fish. Could it even be that the waters are now cleaner than they used to be and the decrease in dairy run-off is contributing to the deterioration in the fishery?
TRM checked with the contributor if we could repeat the comments and he concurred as follows:
I think it would be good for discussion to have it posted. You are welcome to reveal the source. I did my Bachelor of Science with honours in Zoology at the University of Melbourne, with environmental science and some marine biology experience but have since changed field and now work in drug discovery at Monash University.
Cheers,
Steve
Stephen Headey, PhD
Platform Manager
Monash FBDD Platform
Monash Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences
Monash University (Parkville Campus)
381 Royal Parade, Parkville
Victoria 3052, Australia
Tel: +61 3 9903 9543
Fax: +61 3 9903 9582
Email stephen.headey@monash.edu
Interesting stuff. We hope Fish & Game and DOC (Department of Conservation are the Taupo Fishery Managers) and many anglers will be digesting your comments and will be keen to respond…
