EELING

These are a native nocturnal fish in NZ freshwaters. The body is long and snakelike and coloration is dark brown to grey-black with a yellow or grey belly.

They do not usually exceed 1.2 m in length and 10 kg in weight, but exceptional specimens 2 m long and weighing over 50 kg have been reported. The female is consistently almost twice the length of the male.

They are fun to hunt for by spotlight after dark, as that is when they come out to feed. We have many creeks and rivers on our Haupiri Valley estate to hunt these fish in.