Endangered eel on sale

The threatened longfin eel is part of the commercial fishing quota system. Photo / Sarah Ivey

An endangered fish is on sale in Auckland's popular seafood markets, prompting calls for a ban on trade in the species.

The longfin eel may not be as cuddly and endearing as the kiwi, but it is critical to New Zealand's biodiversity, Maori regard it as a taonga, and now experts fear it is being overfished to the point of extinction.

The freshwater fish, known to Maori as tuna, were once plentiful. But because of damage to their habitats through deforestation, pollution and the damming of rivers they are in serious decline.

The Department of Conservation has classified them as endangered.

Yet, with the blessing of the Ministry of Fisheries, commercial fishing of the eel continues - a situation freshwater ecologist Dr Mike Joy described as a "travesty".

"The final nail in the coffin is to have them commercially fished," said Joy.

FishMart at the Auckland fish market sells live eels for $19.95/kg. When the Herald on Sunday visited last week, the eel tank was empty but a staff member said the 40kg of eels that were delivered the day before had sold out.

"Where in the world could you go down to a central-city market and legally buy a live, threatened, endemic animal?" said Joy, of Manaaki Tuna (the Massey University Tuna Research and Restoration Group).

When Joy visited the market on Christmas Eve, at least two-thirds of the eels in the tank were longfins and most would have been at least 30-years-old, he said.

FishMart owner Cam Hadlow said he was aware longfins were threatened and it wasn't his intention to sell them. "Normally the fishermen we get them from don't target them; we just get the shortfins," he said. Longfin eels can weigh up to 40kg but today, you will seldom find one heavier than 10kg - something DoC attributes to commercial fishing.

The Ministry of Fisheries introduced eels into its quota management system between 2000 and 2004, after concern about rapidly declining stock levels since commercial fishing began in the 1960s.

But quota levels have never been reached. "They're going extinct faster than they can drop the quota," said Joy.

"Because the eels breed only once in their lives, when they migrate out to sea just before they die, numbers are not replenishing as they would with other species."

John Taunton-Clark of the Ministry of Fisheries' inshore fisheries division said the quota system was working and limits had not been met due to economic factors, rather than sustainability issues.

Taunton-Clark said the Ministry had monitored the number of longfin eel elvers (juvenile eels) migrating up major rivers for the past 16 years and there has been no decrease.

But Joy said this method was faulty because the Ministry wasn't monitoring smaller rivers that flow into harbours, where most of the decline takes place.