A few of the 4661kg of Koi Carp shot over the weekend Photo: RNZ Ross McNaughton
It was a bad weekend to be a Koi Carp in the Waikato.
The heaviest total in a decade - 4.6 tonnes of the pest fish - was shot, as the New Zealand bow hunting society staged the 35th Annual World Koi Carp classic in Huntly.
Some competitors hunted on foot along the banks of rivers, lakes and farm drains, others from small boats.
At the end of each day they gathered at Ohinewai Hall to have their catch weighed.
Prizes included the heaviest, and smallest, Koi Carp, as well as the heaviest 'other' pest fish species.
Photo: RNZ Ross McNaughton
For some competitors, like Katikati's Paul Huxtable, the Koi Carp classic has become a family affair. His son is now 14, the same age Paul was when he first started competing in the early 1990s.
As well as shooting several bins full of carp, Paul's and his son also managed to rid the area of a few possums.
"A bit of bycatch," Paul laughs. "I don't think they'll make the heaviest 'other' fish though, but you know, one was swimming"
Koi carp are a bit like an aquatic possum in terms of the damage they do to the environment.
A few of the 4661kg of Koi Carp shot over the weekend Photo: RNZ Ross McNaughton
Their feeding habits stir up sediment, worsening water quality and they outcompete native species for food and territory.
Danielle Kruger of Waikato Regional Council said they were also extremely hard to get rid of.
"They aren't bait motivated because they've got an abundance of food in the Waikato catchment," she said.
"And netting is expensive and incredibly labour intensive and it's not really very effective because they're very smart and they learn to evade capture very quickly. When you add to that the fact that a single female could produce 100 to 300,000 eggs in a year, the odds really aren't in our favour"
On the hunt Photo: Supplied
The Koi carp classic has been running for 35 years, in that time members of the bow hunting society have removed more than 100 tonnes of pest fish from the waterways.
But tonnes of dead fish can be tricky to dispose of, and that was where Tawera Nikau came in.
The New Zealand rugby league icon manages a whanau farm at nearby Matahuru and has a long involvement with environmental projects in the area.
"We live on banks of Lake Waikare and one of the things we've been doing in terms of environmental outcomes is really to look at how we could get rid of the koi because it has an impact on our taonga species, especially our tuna and our waterways and the erosion of the banks.
"We started harvesting and fishing koi out of the lake a few years ago and then I got involved with the Koi Classic. So we said, I might as well come and take it and we can sponsor some of the stuff and give some money over."
Bow hunters pose with their catch. Photo: Supplied
Dawn Metcalfe, one of the organisers, said they were very appreciative of Nikau's involvement and could not stage the competition without someone to take away the koi carp.
"Our worst nightmare is being left with a big pile of carp at the end of this competition and that's not happening" she said.
The Koi is put to good use after being run through the processing facility on Nikau's farm. The fillets are turned into petfood, while the carp frames become fertiliser.
"We use that on our farm" he says, "and that's something that we're pretty proud about, getting rid of this pest and having zero waste."
Photo: Supplied
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