Thread: Whitebaiting!

Originally Posted by Smiddy

If you ask me you should have to buy a lisence and there should be a daily catch limit on it, fines should be very large for breaking the rules


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I'm with Smiddy on this, I think it needs to be regulated by a daily weight limit per person & fines imposed for breaking it. It will limit the greed.

I remember about 20 years ago thinking that banning whitebaiting for 5 years would be a good idea and I remember Dad saying to me "bugger that I'll never get to fish for it again".
You know the catches have improved over the last 5 or so years and I have no idea why. Do I think they will be extinct by 2050? no I don't.

The west coast still has great habitat so the whitebait breed well and run well, the east coast has it's ups and downs however a lot of that can be due to the conditions.
Some seasons the weather isn't settled enough, heaps of southerlies and rough seas yet when the conditions come right with northwesters along with the right moon phase they can really go off.

When you hear some of the stories from years ago you can sometimes think they are in decline yet when you compare the number of people whitebaiting today compared to 50 or more years ago you can understand why the few that went out caught so many.
If you added up all the 5 kg catches by the 50 or 100 people on the river today it would add up to the 5 people who caught 40 kg each all those years ago. Like everything the powers that be want to take another recreation off us, they seem hell bent on taking all the fun things out of this world so why not castle another fun activity.

Enjoy it today folks because tomorrow it will be gone

Originally Posted by Mathias

I'm with Smiddy on this, I think it needs to be regulated by a daily weight limit per person & fines imposed for breaking it. It will limit the greed.

Sadly mate you really know nothing about the Coast bait .

Not trying to be facetious mate,I ve whitebaited the Wairarapa,Waikanae,Porirua areas.....Coast bait?....I’d be interested to hear...

Originally Posted by doinit

Sadly mate you really know nothing about the Coast bait .

Originally Posted by A330driver

Not trying to be facetious mate,I ve whitebaited the Wairarapa,Waikanae,Porirua areas.....Coast bait?....I’d be interested to hear...

Check your pm mate.