Editorial: Fishing on a prayer in competition

Only 15 weighable kahawai were caught at a competition over the weekend.

There's a superb photograph hanging at Clifton Cafe.

Four emotionless fishermen grace an aged wooden skiff, with the tiered cliffs of Cape Kidnappers in the background.

The year's unknown. Judging by their clothing, it'd be circa mid-1900s.

But what really dates the shot is their catch.

These are huge fish, abundant, more than half the length of the men standing. Caught on wooden poles in a tiny craft with no fish finders, the bounty could feed a village.

On Sunday, across the Bay from where the shot was taken, a kahawai surfcasting competition drew hundreds. An unremitting line of rods extended along a 4.5km stretch of Marine Parade. Despite the lines being in the water for six and a half hours, only 15 weighable kahawai were caught.

Hence, 3.3 per cent of the 450 competitors hooked up. This, compared with 112 weighable kahawai caught three years ago from the same spot in the same competition.

An organiser said it underlined "the state of the fisheries".

Bereft of quarry, recreational fishermen in this province have only three options to improve their lot:

1) Look to the heavens and ask God for a biblical stunner the likes of which we saw in the miracle of the seven loaves and fishes.

2) Recite an ancient karakia and appeal to the Maori God of the sea, Tangaroa, to fetch them a fish the size Maui caught all those years ago.

3) Or, less realistically, pray that the Ministry for Primary Industries will begin to exhibit some guardianship.

Fishing competition tallies and historic photos don't constitute empirical science. But the overwhelmingly disparaging observations in the past decade are simply too damning - and too consistent - to be dismissed as anecdotal.