Der Schwampenfuhrer

Dad still holds the title, I'm merely Der Schwampenfuhrer Jr. He's back home after 10 days of swamp prep and duck hunting. When I spoke with him last night he sounded tired but happy with the weekend's events. Rick, his mate Jason and AJ's dad went in on Friday night and shot well on Saturday to complete limits for Rick and Jason, while dad and AJ Snr. took 8 birds between them. AJ showed up Saturday night and I think from memory that altogether they got another 10 yesterday. So the first 'week' is over and a mental calculation says 170 birds from the ponds. Not bad at all. And while I can't agree with the 'science' that went into the limit setting process by AW last year, in hindsight it probably was a good call what with the drought....

The Shanks Syndicate

Where to start? After a decent drive down to the Shanks Ranch on Friday night Tim and I rolled up to find James & Shanks in residence. We sat down and regaled each other with tales of opening, James had come off a week of hunting ducks and Shanks had been keeping his head down after a good opening.

We hit the hay quite late in the evening and were awoken to the sound of barking dogs and Craig yelling JAMES! as the other guests arrived at about 7. A brekkie of toast, weetbix & coffee and we saddled up.

The inaugural gathering of the Shanks syndicate - roll call:

The "guns":

Vice Regal Shankspony (Craig)
Top Predator (James)
Cleaky (Tim)
Snuffit



The "manservant":



NZ Varminter (Grant)
& his boy Mitchell

We drove down to start the day by the release pen, the birds had been weaned off weeks ago so were fully wild at this point. What followed was 6 hours of up hill, down dale and bashing through a mixture of rough stuff - all the while putting up birds. Personal highlights: snaking a bird off Tim as it burst from a patch of scrub cackling its head off with a lab hard on its tail (sorry Tim, we're still mates right?), knocking down a melanistic bird at 60m from a highly elevated boulder, but unfortunately we lost this bird in a patch of shitty scrub - and knocking over a goat! Tim got his first wild birds, Craig shot well and James came right even knocking down a bird from a seated postion with his Xtrema near the end of the shooting day. Hunting near bottomless tomos is challenging in itself, my first bird of the day fell straight into one and we just weren't going down there without safety ropes and harnesses. James dropped a high rooster straight into a huge tomo as well - peril to man and dog alike even approaching that one. If nothing else we were under-dogged, having another couple of hounds would have been great in hindsight.



We stopped mid afternoon for a posed photo session, just for fun smoking some big stogies.



And let James pose for the camera with his "gun-boy":



And posed some more:



We got back to Shank's house, had some lunch (Fallow steaks with garlic), watched a film clip or 2 of day's events and cleaned the bag. Later that evening we got ready for a pig hunt, Shanks & Mitchell taking bows, me and Tim with rifles, James with video camera.

We got to the baits a wee bit late to see a black boar and 3 grey pigs milling around. As the wind was right on our face we were able to get within 20 m of the bait. Craig & Mitchell were up front when a grey boar came trotting towards them to within 8m. Craig drew and put an arrow right through the boiler room and the pig ran off up the hill and over the brow. The black boar trotted off leaving the other 2 pigs undisturbed. Craig drew again and nailed a second pig through the spine, dropping it on the spot. The other pig belted off, aided by a wayward shot from me to give it a hurry along. Craig cut the spined pig's throat then we went in search of the first pig with the aid of headlamps. I found it still moving in s patch of scrub and we had 2 in the bag. I have to say that a skilled bow hunter is not to be messed with.



Back to the Shanks homestead again to light a fire, have a bite and then the James party headed out to spotlight another pig or two while we cleaned up a pig for ride home to Ak. Tim and i got out of there at about 8, had a nice drive to Huntly where I dropped tim off and then carried on home. I hung the pig in the garage (v. unhappy wife)and hit the hay tired but very happy.

Roll on day II at the shanks preserve!

A limit a day

Had a chat with Rick, he and his mate Jason are looking to head to the ponds this weekend. While we were chatting, dad called and he's got another limit this morning at Puru. He mentioned that birds are coming through fairly regularly in small numbers which works just great for a lone gunner. So that's a limit a day, not sure I ever did that - go the old boy. Looks like a wet weekend, me and Tim are off to Shanks Ranch for a much anticipated pheasant and pig hunt. Need to get some pork in the freezer so am looking forward to a day of action. Stock up on some roosters too, ahhh life's good!

Update on the Aussies, and from dad

Dad called yesterday to find out where my Roboduk bag is. He's done well taking limits on Monday and again yesterday. Sounds like he's enjoying his retirement and making the most of his opportunities - way to go.

And this from Milo:

From: Miles Rushmer [mailto:milesrushmer@xtra.co.nz]
Sent: Tuesday, 4 May 2010 10:32 p.m.
To: Nick Foster; Brian Waters; Andre Strez
Subject: Re: Lakes

Legend bro!
Enjoyed the aussies today - they were saying they shot their limits of ducks on opening with (Name withheld), Peter Talleys' twin-of sorts.
Sounds like they enjoyed the shoot, and the company, yesterday too.
Fishing was hard today... last time I guided 3 up a stream was 5 years ago... Big loud aussies and stealth don't really fit the day, however they all caught small bows, and had some pretty easy shots at large browns - at best 15lb - needless to say they weren't up to the challenge. Good lads all round tho - fark - he's caught over 30 1000lb marlin and killed 16....best at +1600lb. Gotta love 'em....fucken aussies!
Ranch tomorrow....
Miles Rushmer Guiding
Trophy Trout*Saltwater*Shooting
Bay of Plenty
New Zealand

105 Links Ave
Mount Maunganui
021 371 265
http://www.flyfishingnz.co.nz/fly_fishing_bay_of_plenty.htm

The joy of the season

Friday 31 April
First let me start by saying that this post will be sans photos, somehow I never unpacked the camera once! Anyhow, here's how it unfolded for me. Arrived at Munster Jr's (this year's hosted junior shooter organised by Tim) house at 7.30 for a cuppa and packed his gear into the car and we were off! Relatively uneventful drive to the landing, only a handful of cars were parked there. Dad (who had gone in to the hut the day before) picked us up just after 9, and we got our gear stowed in the hut before lugging the dekes out to the pond. We got Willow set up, then McLennan's, Park, Puru and finally bollocks finishing about 3pm - quite a big effort all in all. The new GHG J weights are a bonus, making life really easy. (Maybe FA can get a similar product on the market Breda? ;)
Rick arrived early afternoon, so back out to Willow to place the splasher flashers, pulsators, his Wonderduck and Roboduk and a dozen of his motion head shell dekes (brilliant!!!). In addition we had my robo and wonderduck so the place looked alive! By the time Rick and I got back both Frank and tom were in residence, leaving just the Hollands to be picked up. Unfortunately the tide was low by then and still going out so a few quick txts to let them know to take their time. Quite a bit of time was spent watching birds pealing into the ponds, and then Frank's dog took off. The neighbours brought the stoopid mutt back and shared a whisky or two before going on their way to have some 'Ambush Stew' - something to do with having to get out of waders fast when the need for a movement arose!!!!
Finally Rick and I got down to pick them up after 8 - having a wee run in with Gus on the way, he got upset with Rick... but anyway.

Saturday 1 May
Up, up and away! Fuelled by veni sausages and porridge, we're clambering into jackets, waders, hoisting ammo, blind bags, rounding up dogs and jumping into boats.
Here's the break down;
Willow pond - Nick & Rick
McLennan's - Andrew H
Watsons - Dad (Dick)
Puru - Tim & Liam (Munster Jr.)
Park - Frank
Bollocks - Tom

Rick and I are placing decoys at 6.10 when we hear the first shots of the season - grrr. 6.15 and a fair barrage goes off. We're still fiddling with batteries and stuff but are relaxed as we'd agreed on drakes only and all week I'd been watching birds in the mornings and couldn't tell ducks from drakes until after 7. We had a fair multitude of birds visit us, letting a good number of hens and greys go unmolested. Can't remember what time we were done, but the 6 bird limit was easily achieved without any dramas. Rick used his new Benelli 28g, and I packed the Winchester for old time's sake. We all meandered back to the hut for lunch, then rick, Tim, me, Frank and dogs went after a rooster who had been cackling. We found where he'd been, for a while the dogs got pretty excited. Back at the hut Andrew and Frank prepared for the evening hunt so Andrew could close out his limit, he needed a final bird. Frank needed 2. Andrew and I propped up McLennan's and waited maybe 90 minutes for a brace to come in. Andrew dropped the drake, finishing the day in fine style. Very gratifying to have resting ducks on the ponds all day too. Back at the hut the day's events were regaled in fine style, then Tim & Tom set to making a fine meal of venison and mashed swede, followed by apple crumble and cream. I seriously ate myself to a stand still. A few high jinks involving an eel and a pukeko carcass, then dragged myself to bed.

4.45 Sunday May 2

The alarm goes off and i'm on breakfast duty so I get up and build the fire, smoking out the top bunk residents in the process. :D This morning the roster is changed around:

Willow - Rick & Frank
McLennan's - Liam
Watsons - Tim
Puru - Tom & Andrew
Park - me
Bollocks - dad

This morning I'm using mr. Xtrema. I call a flock in early (larger groups rarely come in to Willow, with extensive competition from nearby water so its nice to see) and take one drake, missing another as they scattered behind me. Then Robo starts playing up. I change batteries. The Mojo already on the pond isn't working either, so for while its just the good old wonderduck paddling around out there. For the next half hours its backwards/forwards with batteries to Robo, as I discover that flat batteries have been left in the maimai and no sooner have i changed the battery than its flat. I nail a few ducks while up to my chest in water, including a very cool double. Birds come consistantly and I'm done by about 8 o'clock so I call dad over. As he's coming across a flock arrives and he smacks his first bird. Within an hour he's knocked down his limit as well so we hitch a ride from Tim and go about bringing in the first bags of dekes. previous experience with leaving them hidden around the ponds has been ok until last season, when we had upwards of 60 dekes stolen by itinerant shooters. We begin to pluck out the morning's bag, while the guys trickle back from the ponds and join the prduction line - pluck singe, chop, slice, gut, wash, pack. By mid afternoon we're well on top of the job, and dad's mate Larry arrives to join him for a few days.

Rick, Tim, Frank, Tom, Munster Jr and me are leaving today. Rick and I are loading for a couple of Guy's clients tomorrow on a pheasant drive. As it is Lakeland's first real official shoot day we're all keen to make it work so its breeks and ties, fancy socks with tassles and best behaviour. I get home and play with Rilee, clean the gears and put them away and make a nice dinner. Hit the hay early.

Monday June 3

I arrive slightly late at Lakelands, nothing like Monday morning traffic - a mini horror story. The guns today are Australian industrialists, friends of a well known kiwi who made his fortune in fisheries. They are quite down to earth and have travelled the world extensively pusruing fish and beasts. My gun had over a dozen 1000lb marlin to his name and the older gent's biggest trout was a 25lb brownie from Argentina.

The guns started a bit slow to be fair, but by the and of the day had accounted for 255 pheasant and 5 partridge with a few over 1,500 shots. 5:1 is not bad I'm assured. The day went marvellously well, the previous 2 year's practice paid off and it was great to see Guy and Johnno actually relaxed. I took Pete the gamekeeper from Rathmoy to the airport on the way home - now here's an interesting and enlightened dude. Will have to make sure to stay in touch. We also had Tim from Matangerahi onboard as a loader - so in terms of game bird husbandary expertise we were well covered! Caught up with Kawhia as well, he'd had the best opening of his life.

Today's guns are off to fish with Milo for 2 days, maybe no 25lbers but hell they'll see fish over 10lb for sure!

Anyway, back to work. Roll on Saturday and the Shanks Ranch.

Final calls around the traps

Boggy Paul - check. Ready to arrive tomorrow night.
Muddy Tim - check. Ready to arrive tomorrow night.
Sink Hole Rick - check. Coming in after Johnny Nick's funeral tomorrow.
Marshy Dick - check. Already there ("hundreds of ducks")
Swampy Tom - no. Presume he's just chugging along in his own relaxed fashion.
The Quicksand Kid (Frank) - no.
The Raupo Bogeyman - no. Muddy's pickin him up.
The dishes bitch. Ready for me to pick up tomorrow am.
Shanksy - not answering. Prolly fondling his new 16 gauge according to Muddy Tim.
Guy - all ready to rock on the ducks, and Lakelands looking primo

About to sign off for the last time until after opening. Saturday me and Sink Hole will be on Willow Pond, with all of his and my electronica creating waves, ripples, star burts, short circuits and general mayhem. This morning was fine with a big moon and at just before 7am I had trouble distinguishing ducks from drakes; still we're planning drakes only so a good dose of restraint will be required.

Loading for Guy's shooter at Lakelands on Monday and so is Rick. Will have to be on best behaviour and leave the swamp language... in the swamp.

Hot barrels everyone. 10-4.

Have a great opening everyone.

Opening weather

By midnight Friday we should be be in the grip of a northerly fresh breeze, accompanying rain bearing low. So let's call Saturday morning as a sticky warm wet opening. The wind will tend to the south in the afternoon, so it will definitely cool down. Anyone unfortunate enough to be wet from their morning's exertions will feel the chill in the afternoon, but then again so hopefully will the ducks! And hopefully they'll just love the look of nice comfy ponds with nice cover for them to tuck up in with all their mates.

I gotta say, this is looking good!

Shitty slimey rock snot

When the news first broke about Didymosphenia geminata aka Didymo aka Rock Snot (a fresh water diatom) having been found in the Mararoa River and Lower Waiau rivers in 2004 there was a fair bit of hand wringing and teeth gnashing. Within months, outbreaks had been noted in numerous waterways in the lower South Island and MAF released its' Clean Check Dry campaign. But still to this day its all a bit toothless and ineffective. Check this out:



And now for the map of how it has spread:



That it has not been found/spread in the North Island is just a matter of random luck, it has to be. Or another possibility is that the South Island is paradise for Didymo, and paradise must be blighted.

Still no rain up here (was originally the name of today's post)

Admiral Harold Hickling was in the final throes of writing the first cut of his classic book Freshwater Admiral, including maps of the famous Tongariro River pools. This was some time in 1958. Just then it started raining, the rain turned into a deluge, the deluge into a 1 in 100 year flood and woomph the whole river was decimated beyond recognition, undoing a year and a bit of his painstaking work. After all, he did write everything in long hand, with a pen. Goddam! That he sat down, rewrote and remapped the whole shooting match is probably testament to why he ended up being an admiral in charge of whole fleets of ships, back when great Britain had real fleets.

Utilising a keyboard, spell check and all the mod cons I started this blog session thinking of poor TT who took 10 days off to fish the Wanaka district and has been faced with brown water, mobs of ducks and geese mocking him and not a trout in sight. I was bemoaning the lack of rain here again. Here in the middle of Auckland it just wasn't falling, despite the good wife telling me that it was heaving down on the shore. Then the heavens broke. I went oustide to watch the first heavy rain I've seen in about 4 months. I hope the swamp got a dose, even a surface flush would be a bonus. Not that it will help the dry ponds all that much unless it persists, but damn its rain!!!

Water, water everywhere

But really, its not. F&G blocks on the whole are either dry, or getting that way. ABCD Flax Block (not a F&G block)is semi dry. The big "Duck Factories" of the 80's & 90's are almost anything but. Add in botulism and you'd have every reason to be quite pessimistic about your chances of getting a duck or 2. But the AW banding results from early this year, while not 'crunched' and 'documented' indicated that the traditional moulting/banding sites were anything but under-populated, in fact they were crawling with birds and the catch rate was as high or higher than ever before. While the data is extraordinarily skewed to the actual locations of the banding sites, the scientific facts are that duck numbers in the region are hardly dwindling, if anything the birds have simply moved to where the habitat meets their needs.

In terms of environmental factors I feel genuinely sorry for the blokes who slog their guts out defending, improving and enhancing wetlands and then have no water, but the facts are that dry seasons do happen, and when they do its going to be a hard road ahead for them. The investment in wetland management, and in fact all types of waterfowl hunting is a big one and I simply don't know of any really succesful guys who just turn up on the day and shoot hoards of birds - well maybe with the exception of maize field shooting, but even then adequate camo and good dekes make a difference and they both take time and effort to maintain. The mudflat guys prep their boats and given that they stay in or on the water 2 months of the year (the Firth of Thames floating maimai ones)they need to be maintained and prepped well in advance. The pond guys need to be spraying, chopping, dragging and generally maintaining on an ongoing basis and that takes a chunk of time and commitment. The point is I suppose, that with all of that outlay it ought to be reasonable to expect a return by way of a harvest. Some guys may be happy to sit in the maimai on a dry pond and have a beer or 2 to pass the day, but the average joe license holder is probably going to reconsider his or her investment in a license if they get hammered by the conditions year after year. And this is shaping up as one of the tough seasons. I drove to Hamilton and back twice in the past 5 days, and can say I have never seen the river so low. The Mangatawhiri River which borders the Dean and Cocks blocks is so low that only the deep channel is carrying water. There were good numbers of birds in some spots on the Waikato, but even she's really low with sandbars exposed that are normally 4-5 feet under water. So will we see a fall in license sales next year? F&G is desperately under-funded and calling on regions to tap into their reserve funds to put into the central pool (ehem) so any weather related impact on license revenue is going to hurt.

Putting life into perspective though - now something like 70% of the national dairy herd is living in drought regions. Production impact is being forecast at anywhere between 2-5% of total output and some farmers are in desperate cash flow strapped situations. We need to spare a thought for those families affected and wish for them that the rains come soon.

And when they do, so hopefully will the ducks come to the F&G swamp blocks, and i really do hope that this happens before Queens Birthday when they are closed up to hunter access.

From the lads

35 bundles of tea tree were sawn down, hog tied and delivered to the swamp. The lads started before 8am and didn't get back to the landing until 5pm so she was a fair day's work. The Park Grand Mansion gobbled up 11 bundles, she's a massive maimai that one. The boys cut several bundles of very long stuff for McLennan's and it sounds like they did an awesome job. Waikato H&F put on their annual duck hunters shoot yesterday, and when I spoke with Andy H in the morning it sounded as though hundreds of shooters turned out. Dad competed in the shoot-off for top place, coming in third behind Larry Discombe and XXX, good to see that the old fellah is still at the top of his game.

A wee (twisted meheh heh)discourse on competition shooting. Deep down I know that I haven't got the mental game to do well at this discipline. I get bored. I lose concentration. I start hot and finish luke warm. I used to shoot skeet every week 15 years ago and would get lots of 23's & 24's. The occasional 25 would come my way, and it wasn't the same target that I missed either, but I'd just get bored, or be drifting away, or whatever, consistency eluded me. DTL bored me silly. Sort of like shooting against pre-programmed robots. I did shoot a couple of sporting events as a "non registered/non graded" shooter and did well enough to win. But I doubt I'd do as well now, back then I was shooting an awful lot and now its very seasonal.

Does competition shooting help with game shooting? I think it must, if your gun comes up the same way every shot, and if you're not dealing with raised cheek/lifted head syndrome and if you have your sight pictures sorted then surely you're going to do well on birds? But do game birds fly straight? (Clays mostly do, apart from battue, running rabbit, springing teal). Why do real birds put so many top shooters off their game? See it must be a mental thing. You MUST pick your target, you must watch your target, you must kill your target and be computing the next one. I've seen some guys really get worked up about shooting at real live birds. So add in, you must relax. And you must have an arsenal of sight pictures to draw on. Here's a neat thing I thought of ages ago that works for me. I watch the bird's chin. Be it a duck or oncoming rooster, I'm watching the chin just behind the beak. Its an almost perfect place to be concentrating on for the majority of incoming or crossing shots that present themselves. [Prolly why I don't get many quail, they are chinless!!!! :)]. Shoot 'em in the chin. Don't watch the body, if you watch that chances are your shot charge will take the rear of the bird which is a crippling shot. With enough experience you'll also mentally sort your chances. You'll have an A, B & C target option - and I suppose those guys with 9 shots up the spout have to have more than that when 30 geese come in.

That was Snuffit on shotgunning. God bless the target shooters, keeps ammo prices down. ;D

Ducky AGM

Last night the Upper Piako wetland Management Association held its AGM. Turnout was good, but again, as with EPCM meeting last October, the demography was staggering. 95% of attendees would have been over 40 years of age. I don’t know what to read into this as it was not a school night (holidays), but I can’t help but think that we’re still not recruiting youngsters into our shooting sports. While no one new stood for any of the seats on the committee, it seems that the vibe was overall one of being relatively happy with the direction of the group. The DOC guy presented on hydrology and “herbography” (god I’m lost for the word…. Hmmm) studies undertaken on the Kopuatai peat dome, and it was good to see some results from the funds levied from area users being put to work. Topography of the overall wetland is staggeringly interesting if you’re into that stuff, with quite an array of differences above mean sea level. There are 2 quite distinct epi-centric “humps” if you like, one in the north of the block, the other at south eastern side. On the vegetation front, I got the impression that DOC had learned that mass boom spraying of grey and crack willow trees is a stupid idea, simply leading to encroachment of surface growing noxious weeds. Lots of noxious weeds. The blackberry infestation at the Willow Pond is a direct result of the removal of the willow canopy. Anyway, they won’t be doing that anymore; as Mr. Doc said they simply can’t control the willow population seed crop with spray. The hydrology stuff was interesting; our ponding sites are one of 9 locations chosen for attention. Mr. Doc really needs a history lesson, but he seemed quite casual about it when dad offered advice & support. Personally I felt uneasy about the guy. At least for the first time there’s an indication that Doc want water kept in at sustainable levels all year around.
Went to Rick’s work yesterday for a chat. Like a duck shooter’s convention it was; Lance Faulkner, John Fraser, Aj and a few others surrounded by dekes, ammo, camo… great stuff! John Fraser is a police dog handler and a gun SWF angler, so we had a good catch-up about happenings involving marker buoys, rocky headlands and line ripping kingis. Cool.
Paul emailed this morning that we have only 22 sleeps to the BIG DAY.  Excitement is building!

At the Noises

Garth Planck, TT and me met at TT's house yesterday to go for a snapper fish. I had thought we were fishing a shallow reef off one of the city's main beaches, so was not really prepared for the trip that we ended up doing to the noises. Bags of pillies and burley were purchased, then we gassed up the boat and headed to Okahu Bay. Launching was a breeze, and we headed off on a mill pond like sea. 40 minutes later and we were at anchor, pumping burley. I packed the 6 weight for small snapper action; Garth (world class competition angler) had his 15 weight Gatti on board. We fished baits, catching snaps regularly of small to medium size, as it happened the big boys didn't come out to play. Occasionally kingis would buzz the clouds of piper in our burlry trail and the fly rod would come out - Garth's that is, I'm far too chicken to play with 5kg + kingis on a 6 weight!!! The incoming current poured our burley into a reef system with channels interspersed with rocks, pefect snapper territory. Being a bit bored soaking bait I rigged a small black Clouser and cast it across current, getting a good drift and sink. I caught snapper after snapper in the 20 - 30cm class which was really good fun. Fly was beating bait 2-1 as well, a nice result.
As the tide began to turn (out) the snaps dried up so we upped anchor to chase some work ups which turned out to be horse sized kahawai in the 3kg range. The 3 fish I caught took me a while to land, was wishing for the 8 weight after a while. The backing loop wizzing through the guides reminded me why kahawai shit all over trout on the fly rod.
Fresh fish, a nice touch of sun and a good relaxing day out, man I slept like a baby. :)

Almost there!

Big team back for further pond preps on Good Friday. Rick, Frank, Dad, Andrew, Paul & me. Tim's away after a stag and Tom at Warbirds over Wanaka. We had to fix a walkway between boat landings where the bak was collapsing, trim back the overgrown willow trees around Puru and Willpow Pond maimais, fix the McLennan's maimai wall, feed out and last but not least build a spillway to stop bank erosion around DOC's ill founded and stupid dirt dam. Another big day out, but always feels good to get on top of those jobs. Even gave the hut a vacuum clean! Yup, that's right, a vacuum in the duck hut. Lots of ducks araound, all last weekends hand feeding eaten, the big feeders well trodden around but unfortunately the new feeder seemed not to be working. Who knows why? Next weekend is tea tree day. That'sll be the last big mission pre-season, barring taking in the dekes. :)

From the Secretary of Upper Piako Wetland Management Association

Mike O'Donnell's our user group secretary, and the AGM has come around again. Here's the newsletter:

2010 NEWSLETTER of the UPPER PIAKO WETLANDS ASSOCIATION MANAGEMENT COMMITTEE.

It’s that time of the year, duckshooting is drawing near but the AGM is closer still. It will be at the usual venue, the Hauraki North Rugby Clubrooms, Waitakaruru, Wednesday, 7 April at 7.30pm. Attend and have your say. Raise any issues. Ask any questions. Your input is valued. Come and enjoy the evening.
Guest Speaker: John Gumbley, the Biodiversity Programme Manager for DoC will speak to us on the implications of the recent hydrological report and the subsequent ideas and intentions. He will have different maps of the area and you will be surprised at how close to sea level you are!!!
Grayson Reynolds from the Kopu Hunting & Fishing there with licences and a limited array of what shooters might want. He has his big night on Friday 23 April with specials, nibbles and a bar. Grayson will provide the raffle.
Flax Block Shooters: Peter Monrad has just repaired the track. Gate is locked after ‘pegging out’ day. Access up the track by quad only in order to preserve the bund/track which has been repaired and upgraded by us. The track has cost shooters $7,000 in the past 2 years to repair damage done by 4 x4s. DoC and the committee have erected a second gate at the “possum proof” gate as people cut the chain on the one at the Maukoro Landing.
Junior Shooters Ponds: Pete Monrad went in a cleaned around the banks and work was done on the maimais.
Water levels: Okay for a few but some ponds are dry. You can keep an eye on it from home by going into the Enviroment Waikato website and ‘bookmarking’ the Maukoro Landing rainfall site. Jan and March were dry. We have had 88 mls this year and 347 for the 4 months prior to that. Hopefu
Patetonga Lake: Steve Clark gathered the shooters as the weed has increased and reduced the water area by about a third. They are collectively buying the spray and application
Duck numbers: It has been an excellent breeding season so duck numbers are looking good for the season.
Duck banding: Over 2000 ducks were banded by Murray Fisher and an assorted array of volunteers in our region. Please be sure to hand in any bands or at least telephone in their numbers to Fish & Game.
Predator Control: We have Richard Henry traps available at the AGM. Self resetting, CO2 powered. $120
Tree planting: Another 250 kahikateas were planted opposite the Maukoro Landing in September.
Relationship with DoC: The committee been in regular contact with John Gumbley, the Programmes Manager and Amy McDonald, the field officer on a regular basis. We are ready to take the relationship to a new level and develop a Memorandum of Understanding. We need to move forward from the 1994 letter from the then Waikato Conservator, Stella Penney. DoC are clear about wanting a more consistent water level for the benefit of the biodiversity of the bogland so that is good news for duck shooters. Insurance Cover: A paid up member of the UPWMA has $1,000,000 Public Liability General Indemnity cover; $250,000 Statutory Liability Cover & $250,000 Public Liability Forest & Rural Fire Protection Cover. A big thanks to Dick Foster for arranging this for us.
Mark up Day: 4 April
Committee member nominations: If you want to nominate someone for the committee, please get your nominations back to the secretary by 6 April at 116 Regent Heights, Thames. Current elected members are: Steve Chapman, Murray Fisher, George Avery, Steve Clark, Dick Foster(Treasurer), John Smith and Mike Waterhouse. Seconded members: Mike O’Donnell nand Gordon Munroe; Projects subcommittee: George Avery, Steve Chapman, Murray Fisher, Mike Waterhouse Memorandum of Understanding subcommittee: John Smith, George Avery and Mike O’Donnell, Steve Chapman
Nomination form.
I hereby nominate …………………………………….. as a member of the Upper Piako Wetlands Association Committee.
Signed:…………………………………………………..
Seconded by:…………………………………………………..
Membership subscriptions $15 per person. Please make sure all your party sign up because we need numbers to substantiate our claim as a user group or when we apply for funding, and on crucial occasions, a pressure group.
If you can not get to the AGM then send your subscription along with another member or post it to the secretary at 116 Regent Heights, Thames. You may even prefer to pay your sub prior to the AGM.

Name:………………………………………………

Address:……………………………………………
Telephone number:………………………………
Email Address........................................................................................…
Secretary’s email address is mike.odonnell@xtra.co.nz Cell: 0274363836

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Thanks Mike. Good to see that we're working alongside the new DOC regime, the previous establishment was anti-hunting, anti-duck, anti-willow tree, anti anti anti ...anything. We all know their funding is cut, so it really does make much more sense to work with users rather than quash or try to obliterate our efforts. Given the profound lack of funds that they put towards us, the people who maintain water levels and the environment, trap the predators, keep noxious weeds at bay it is slightly gratifying to see that they may actually appreciate us. Enough chip on the shoulder stuff! Looking forward to the AGM next week.

Pond Preparations

We knew that there was a hole around our main dam that holds the water through our ponds and the neighbour's system. But where? Around the main face there were no cavities or flow, nor around the edge that we suspected of leaking. We figured it was an eel hole. Eels are tough. The buggers are relentless when they find their way blocked and over a period of time find ways of boring through mud and clay and reaching the far side. Nothing anyone can do about that. So the plan was for me, Frank, Tom & dad to get into the ponds, fix the dam if possible, mark the ponds and put out the feeders. When we arrived we found that foot wide hole in the floor where rats had chewed away at rotten fibrebord - the leakiing roof had caused the board to turn to sort of a dusty weetbix. So Tom and Frank got on with repairs, while dad and I opened the dam and began to search for the leak. We finally found it, about 4 feet up and oppsite where we had suspected, a good sized eel hole. We jammed mud & concrete bags in and seemed to have blocked it quite well. Back to the hut we spent an hour cutting firewood to dry for the season.

A couple of jobs down. Even so we were now well into the afternoon, with the feeders to set up and marking up to do. We'd brought in 240kg of maize, the big feeder and a new one that dad had picked up for the western edge of the ponds. Marking up Bollocks on the way, we moved down and tagged Puru then went to put out the big feeder. Stariaght away I saw piggie tracks - never seen them here before. We put up the big feeder and loaded it.



Over to put out the new feeder, then we filled buckets to feed at Watson's, McLennan's, Willow and Park. Some of the maimais are pretty bare, we're going to need an absolute shit-load of tea tree this year. Park needs a heap (big maimai), McLennan's at least 10 bundles...

By now it was getting close to 4pm and I knew that it was a bigger day than i would have thought. The tide was below the boat ramp when we left to go home, but we managed to winch the boat on anyhow. Met Gus at the ramp, no water at all in the Big pond. Drought.

And overall, not that many ducks around. Would have been lucky to see 50.

Icy blasts, disgruntlement & black marlin

This week the first real southerly system since October arrived. The timing is both apt and eerie - apt because today duck licenses go on sales and eerie because all of a sudden the trigger finger has the big itch on and its brought back all this deja-vu stuff that I've suffered since I was a primary school kid with the duck season fast approaching. Restricted/denied access to resource is raising its ugly head again, and again its proving to be the issue of our time. Refer the situation where Iwi, in consultation with DOC have closed duck hunting access to the Pencarrow Lakes under the guise of 'stopping the spread of didymo' and 'protecting the giant kokopu".

Arse.

I reckon that this is a bridge too far - I've long felt that supporters of shooting sports are more vocal, political and mobilised than anglers and the reaction to this will prove it. Politicos are on the band wagon and John Key has said 'sort it!' so maybe it will be. About time someone wound in the necks of those tree hugging fools in DOC. Maybe, just maybe I'll be able to visit and have a giant kokopu shoot.

On to the Kaingaroa, closed to sporting access subsequent to the transition of ownership from crown to Iwi. This situation is diaboloical - refer Easter F&G website for latest news & events (for some reason I can't get hyperlinks to work on my blog at the moment).

Although I hear through the grapevine that Iwi are pretty unhappy with the Kaingaroa situation, something big will have to change before Flaxy, Whio and Rangitaki are again viable summer fishing options. Oh, and as long as you only want to do weekends. Screw that. Pressure is on Eastern F&G to get something better sorted, because settling for this is just the thin end of the wedge.

Got off the plane at Ak airport last night, fired up the mobie and rang Marcia. While speaking a mini-flood of texts came in. Terminated the call and started reading:

1. "Moerewa!" - from Nik, our standard chit chat as he passes through the most god-awful township in NZ. (Barring Huntly. But Huntly has both trout and duck/goose shooting which gives it a distinct advantage).
2. "222.5 black marlin! Stoked!" - From Milo. I rang for the story. He woke up late, got on the blower to Roly who had a day off, so they set off for Astrolabe. Upon arriveal the skippes were being pushed smack bang onto the reef. Out with the soft plastics and 2 bridle rigged skippies were on the outriggers. 2 minutes later a strike - 2.5 hours later, a black marlin on the deck. Nice work fellahs!
3. "Roly and Miles caught 222 kg black marlin!" - From Nik. He and Roly fish together, amazing how good news spreads.

And to think last week i was saying the southerly will have killed off the marlin fishing. Just goes to show, if the food's there, they will be too

Stag do

Andy H's stag do was the big weekend event - and boy was it a laugh at times! Me, Tim and Paul met at Uncle Tom's place to pick up his boat, and despite our latish start we arrived at Whangamata before lunch, put our stuff in the bach, loaded the boat and headed down to the ramp where we met Andy and his bag of pillies. The wind was quite a stiff SW "gusting 30 kts" (who would have guessed?) from time to time. We headed north so didn't get too drenched, found the other bloke's boat and anchored upstream and upwind of them. We were bouncing a bit and while they seemed to have a steady stream of fish coming aboard, we struggled for a while. A few rig changes to stuff more appropriate to 20 m off ofshore as opposed to 14.5m of Rangi Channel, as well as letting out more anchor rope got us right into a patch of trevs. We all caught a few and then Paul's rod nodded deeply and stayed that way. He brought up a farkin horse sized Johnnie that had swallowed a baby snap - i told him to swing the rod tip to me so i could grab the Johnnie but he tried to lift the fish into the boat - it promptly spat the snap, momentarily floundered on the surface then dived away with a burst of speed that I had no idead a JD posessed. A few barely legal snaps tthen the other boys upped anchor and took off. We headed in-shore to flick a few flies, Tim caught some baby snaps then it was golf time. Back ashore a quick change of clothes, a divvy up of various ancient golf clubs and we set off. 4 teams of 2, Ambrose rules, and ample ale. Andy by now was in his stag regalia, a nice white dress with red dotty flowery things, a nice shade of red lipstick, hand bag, diamante tiara and a veil - quite fetching! General hilarity broke out as we burned up the course - worse for me was that even though i was relatively sobre I was the worst player by some margin! Whangamata golf course on a Saturday afternoon in March is a nice place to be, especially with a raving homo in a dress running around for entertainment. Back at base the evening progressed with games like "3 man" (involves a funny hat, rolling dice and the 3 man getting hammered as the rule book gets developed along the way), "what the f*ck" (involves the person being questioned to give a yes/no answer to a question that the group has to answer. Those in the group who answer the same as the questionee escape drinking)and regular shots of Jagermeister (sp) which tastes like sweet gear box oil with lots of alcohol content. The poor stag was getting obliterated, and there my tale ends because "what happens on tour..."

Needless to say that Sunday morning was a quiet affair. Nice to get on the water and spend time with the lads.

That southerly will have killed the marlin fishing dead though I reckon.

Getting old - the yow factor

Friday was a dog. Last day of month, a heap of work dramas, and only small positives to counter the balance - and then arrived home after the worst week for a long time to discover that my wallet was missing. Frantic calls to the bank to cancel my cards, another to a colleague to arrange to grab his access card for work so I could back track, a drive to his place in the back end of Albany Heights, another drive into town in peak traffic and a frantic run into the office. There was my wallet, under the desk. Back to the car, 20 minutes on the phone ‘uncancelling’ my credit card then back home arriving about 8. Still had to pack the yak for Saturday’s mission and then rattle up the fishing gear. Was after 9 before I was ready to sit down and work on tomorrow’s plan. Saturday I arrived at TT’s at 5.45am and kicked his ass out of bed. By 6.15 we had his yak onboard and were off on an amended mission, rather than the ‘African Queen’ adventure down the Ongarue we headed for another spot involving a yak trip up a feeder into a hydro lake. By 9.15 we were on the water heading upstream and as always in a new spot I spent time looking around. The paddle was really enjoyable. We pulled ashore just downstream of the first rapid system where TT told me that 3 weeks ago the water was a good 5m higher. He rigged his 4 weight with a bead head and indicator and I took the first stretch, hitting a fish almost immediately and that set the tone of the day. Swapping places he dragged one out and then we jumped back in the yaks and crossed the canyon and jumped out on the other side. A bush bash upstream, a dodgy crossing and we started up some really interesting water. Round about here I should say that I have never ever fished on such slippery rocks in my life, the bed was solid carved rock with a film of algae that made the Mohaka and Ruakituri ‘pink slime’ seem tame. (Brings back memories of walking the river bed in upper Ruakituri singing “I’m walking on pink slime, woah-oh, I’m walking on pink slime..” to the tune of “I’m walking on sunshine”). If I slipped once, I slipped a hundred times. We both had heavy falls. I wasn’t in my aquastealth studded boots and boy did I regret not packing them. The fishing in some stretches was nothing short of brilliant, above the falls only rainbows reside and in good numbers. Size wise a 3lb fish is a goodie up there, but having big numbers made up for it nicely. Highlights included a really good fish that gulped a Stimulator at the very end of a long drift just as the weight of current carrying the fly across and down a deep dark green pool started to sink the bug. A bulge in the current and a quick strip strike set the hook momentarily until the fish took air and threw the hook after several mighty leaps. We struggled upstream and in 4 hours covered maybe a km and a half but had a steady stream of fish banked and lost. In one pool I finally caved, tied on the Tongariro rig and bombed the bottom of the pool. Before we left that pool we had banked 9 fish and lost another couple, one which ran hard upstream and busted my 2.4 kg tippet like it wasn’t there. Stopping for lunch at a hunters biv we caught our breath, compared skating wounds and then carried on up. One of TT's fish fought amazingly, leaping 9 times before being banked. Finally at what we estimated to be 2pm we decided to turn and got back downstream in about 50 minutes. The crossing back was even dodgier, so it was a relief to finally get back in the yak. I rigged a sink tip and Woolly Bugger and we made our way slowly downstream looking for fish sheltering in the deeper corners. I caught a scraggy brown over a weedbed and then paddled down to where the drop off from river to lake was and caught a couple of small bows. We pulled the pin shortly after and I was surprised that it was 5pm already. We set off for home reflecting that our fishing spot is quite remote, access is hard, fotting was terrible and we hadn’t let anyone know where we were… in short it was dodgy and we are both getting far too shaky for dodgy stuff. Home to TT’s by 8 and then home to square everything away, I realised that I was really shagged. Lots of bruises, lots of trout. A day that will live with me a while I’m sure.

Yakkity yak

The yak fleet were out in force off Narrowneck yesterday (Saturday) morning. With an incoming tide and no moon in the sky it looked like a good morning, the only thing that was a slight worry was a rising NW wind as the day progressed. I was out of bed at 4.30, wanting to nab an easy car park. A couple of gyus were thre already setting their yaks up. Paddled hard across a more Northerly than NW chop and made the channel; ducked across as a cruise liner came around Rangi, and set up my first drift. A bit of messing with the fishfinder because it was showing an unlikely amount of bait - as it turned out it was telling the truth. The fishin was steady for me, once I found the schools. The wind did get up and the drift was fast, but while the current was running the fish bit. About 7.30 the tide slackended, and as usual so did the bite. By now the breeze was NW and fresh, it was a hard paddle back into the face of it but got to the ramp and met up with a bloke I know from the fishing.net forum - his 2 best fish of about 10 & 8lbs dwarfed my best. I kept 6 which is about as much fish as I know what to do with given that I don't much like freezing it.

Yakking is good cheap clean fishing, and as long as you don't mind not being able to move around the craft much is about as close to self sufficient 'boat' fishing that
I know.

Again i took only soft bait, and seem to be getting better 'at it' ; although I did drop a few fish that picked up the bait and avoided my strike. Practice makes perfect - but I suspect perfection would be boring!