Greg Northe

1. EXPERIENCE IN AOTEAROA/NZ COASTAL ENVIRONMENTS

CRAWFORD: Where were you born, Greg?

NORTHE: Napier.

CRAWFORD: What year were you born?

NORTHE: 1961.

CRAWFORD: What age did you first start spending a significant time on or around the water?

NORTHE: Napier, everyone lives in or around the water. It's such a hot climate, we were always swimming as kids in the rivers and the seas and things.

CRAWFORD: First memories then?

NORTHE: Yeah, first memories.

CRAWFORD: Alright. I'm guessing to begin, you would have been around the water, but always with somebody else supervising?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Did you swim from an early age?

NORTHE: Oh, I had to be rescued twice in my life, from drowning. Once when I was caught in a rip. Hawkes Bay is notorious for some of its rips in the sea. I was rescued by lifeguards there once, when ... I can hardly even remember, so I must have only been like five or six or something like that. And another time, apparently, I fell off a lilo when I was bench supervised, and somebody had to grab me because I hadn’t been to swimming.

CRAWFORD: Fell off a what?

NORTHE: A lilo, a floating air mattress.

CRAWFORD: You would have been less than ten years old?

NORTHE: Oh yeah, less than five.

CRAWFORD: When you say you were 'saved', was it a Surf Living Saving Club environment - where you were swimming between the flags?

NORTHE: One was. And the other one was in a public swimming pool. I've only been told this anecdotally by my Parents. I can't remember it at all.

CRAWFORD: When you were young, did you ever do any fishing or anything with family?

NORTHE: Yes. We were all keen outdoors people in my family. Trout fishing, especially, in the rivers. Things like that. We did one early fishing trip out in Hawkes Bay, when I got violently seasick for seven or eight hours, and hated it. Apart from that, I learned to scubadive a wee bit, and did some little bit of Floundering around in the water. But not enough to really ...

CRAWFORD: If we progress up to a point where you started to have a little bit more independence, what age were you when you could basically go off with your mates? When you weren’t confined to just being with your Parents on the weekends or holidays or whatever? When did you get a bit more freedom like that?

NORTHE: Probably around thirteen, fourteen years old - we were allowed to take off on the weekends. As long as we were home that night.

CRAWFORD: What kinds of things around coastal New Zealand would you have been doing?

NORTHE: Probably mainly swimming, and a little bit of Pāua diving I suppose in those days. Trying to spear a fish as well. 

CRAWFORD: If you were to kind of put a percentage overall, maybe 1/3 swimming, 1/3 Pāua diving and 1/3 spearfishing? Or some other combination?

NORTHE: Most of it would have been just pleasure swimming with friends. Once again, the hot summers just drove me to the sea. Or to things like windsurfing came along a little bit, I've had a go at that. Had a go at surfing, had a go at freediving, Only small amounts of my time. I never spent a lot of time doing any of those things.

CRAWFORD: Ok. So maybe down around the 10 percent for diving and spearfishing?

NORTHE: Yeah, always.

CRAWFORD: Because you lived so close to the coast, I’m imagining even during the school year, evenings or afternoons after school, weekends - you were often down at the beach?

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: Because it was right there. It's not the same type of thing for somebody that lives more inland, like Gore or whatever, where they have to drive. You were right there.

NORTHE: Yeah. And it’s sort of a pastime in New Zealand. You can go to the beach, the family goes to the beach. Go and have a party at the beach, have a bonfire at the beach. Hawkes Bay was well into the 30°C - it's just hot, so you just lived in the water. You know, what a great pastime.

CRAWFORD: You were doing that through your early days. Then at some point you got a little bit more freedom. You go off, and maybe your range expands a bit. When did you first start spending more time away from Napier, going on trips - either on your own or with mates or whatever?

NORTHE: I left school and went into Smedley Station, a training farm in the middle of central Hawkes Bay. So, I was pretty much confined to a country environment for those two years. When I left there, I became what they called a shepherd - mind dogs and horses and things like that. I went off and did my own thing for a couple more years. And then sort of headed up ... realizing I'd never buy a farm of my own - it's a lot work for very little money. I was probably also getting pretty interested in girls about that stage. So, I moved back into the city, and got town jobs.

CRAWFORD: 'The city' meaning Napier?

NORTHE: Yeah. In and around there.

CRAWFORD: Ok. When did you leave Napier? 

NORTHE: I left Napier to come here.

CRAWFORD: I meant for the Cadetship. There was a period of time when you were away from the water - when did that start and when did that end? Roughly.

NORTHE:  Well, I left school when I was at the end of my fifth form, I would have been 15, just going on 16 when I was accepted for the Cadetship.

CRAWFORD: And that was for two years?

NORTHE: Two year Cadetship, yeah.

CRAWFORD: Then you decided to go back to Napier?

NORTHE: No, I went off and worked. After that two years, I spent another couple of years on different farms - one of them being a coastal farm. We did a lot of Pāua diving there, but mainly at low tide. It was easy to get Pāuas. You didn’t have to actually dive for them, you just waded around and got them.

CRAWFORD: But that was still time you were spending around a coastal environment?

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah.

CRAWFORD: And if coastal things were happening, you would have heard about them too, right? 

NORTHE: Yep, yep.

CRAWFORD: You were off on this Cadetship, and then working on farms for about four years?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: When you did come back, even though you were still working on farm-related things, where were you? Was that still the Hawkes Bay region?

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: If I’m doing my math right, you were getting into your late teens by then?

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: What was the next significant change, either in location or activity?

NORTHE: It would have to be coming to Stewart Island.

CRAWFORD: What age were you, when you came here?

NORTHE: Well, I came here in '88.

CRAWFORD: I think that makes you about 23?

NORTHE: 23.

CRAWFORD: Why did you come to Stewart Island?

NORTHE: A friend of mine, I used to go out with his sister, who also used to live in Napier - he was an ex-SAS soldier.

CRAWFORD: Special Forces?

NORTHE: Yeah. He decided to build a house down here. And somewhere along the way, he rung me up and said "Would you like to come for a holiday? Bring your rifle and a pack." I had just finished art school.

CRAWFORD: You finished what?

NORTHE: Art school. Where I concentrated on my carving, and sculpture, and things like this.

CRAWFORD: When did that come in? Was that in your 4-5 year period just prior to you coming here?

NORTHE: In the two years before I came to Stewart Island.

CRAWFORD: So, the decision about farming, that it wasn’t for you ... that was followed by art school. And then you came here to Stewart Island?

NORTHE: Yep. Left school, farming, silly jobs, art school, Rakiura.

CRAWFORD: You came, and never went back?

NORTHE: Yep, exactly.

CRAWFORD: Around 1988, you were 23 years old when you got here. What kinds of things did you do in those early days?

NORTHE: Because he was a friend of mine, because he was that sort of personality as a guy, he just grabbed me and sort of taught me almost like I was one of his soldiers. It was really fun. Immediately I was immersed into diving, hunting, racing around in boats, racing around Stewart Island. Just what an amazing, eye opening. mind blowing experience of this place. You could do anything. Especially the hunting.

CRAWFORD: Was your friend an Islander?

NORTHE: No.

CRAWFORD: This is not related directly but ... how did he know to even be here?

NORTHE: I’m not quite sure how he originally came here. But being that sort of a person ... yeah, he was probably looking for the more outlying places, the different sorts of areas, the more adventure parts of New Zealand to come to.

CRAWFORD: Ok. So, from 23 years old you were hanging with him, and you were doing a whole bunch of different things?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Many of them on, or below, the water?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: How long did that go on for? When was the next significant change, in terms of either location or activity?

NORTHE: Well, it's still ongoing.

CRAWFORD: But there would have been a job here at some point - something that would have taken up much of your time?

NORTHE: I worked for six months, after I first came here, on a casual basis, on one of the Salmon Farms in Big Glory Bay. I had to account for the maturation of male fish. In those days we used to scoop net them out. It went for weeks and weeks and weeks. You had to actually sort every fish out of nets, for another net. Nick out the males, and leave the females.

CRAWFORD: When did you start casually working for the Fish Farm?

NORTHE: Probably in the first few weeks I was up here.

CRAWFORD: Amongst other things? You were doing a bunch of other things, but you were casual labour at one of the Salmon Farms?

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah.

CRAWFORD: Was this back in the day when there were multiple Salmon Farms running?

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: And how long had those farms been in operation before you started working for them? Roughly?

NORTHE: There was three farms there, when I came to the Island. Ah sorry, four farms. And they'd only been going for the last four or five years before I got here.

CRAWFORD: So, still relatively fresh operations?

NORTHE: Very fresh. And very new technology. Couldn’t find any technology from anywhere else, it was sort of being done as we went - by the seat of the pants. New Zealand’s got a great saying, "Get a piece of #8 wire and fix it." [both chuckle] So in those days, a lot of it was just people’s own perception of how we did this. But I think the big thing with Big Glory Bay, or Stewart Island waters, is it grows a very, very good product. Because of its water temperature, its cleanliness. There’s no runoff, there’s no farms, there’s no forestries. And what floods and climatic events we do get, because it's so bushed, it doesn’t have as much effect. Amazing place to live and work. Amazing place to live and work.

CRAWFORD: Your casual employment at the Fish Farm, that started relatively soon after you got here. You spent a lot of time around the pens, but were you doing any work diving at this point?

NORTHE: Oh, I was taught to dive actually from that first week.

CRAWFORD: Net repair, inspections, mortalities - those types of thing?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Was it on-the-job-training for scuba? Or did you already have your dive licence before you got here?

NORTHE: No, no.

CRAWFORD: It was commercial diving, though. You got certified commercial?

NORTHE: Yeah. Well, in those days, all we needed was a PADI open-water ticket.

CRAWFORD: For employment? For diving for work?

NORTHE: Yes, as soon as you had your PADI open-water, you can work.

CRAWFORD: Ok, alright. From the time you got here, when you were on the water, was it mostly in Halfmoon Bay, Horseshoe Bay and Paterson Inlet? Or did you spend significant time early on around the rest of the Stewart Island as well?

NORTHE: The most significant was on the sea cages, and for the work requirements there. But for ages, we'd take our gear home on the weekends, and then go diving elsewhere. A lot of it was out here, around here in the Islands.

CRAWFORD: The Titi Islands?

NORTHE: Yeah. Also, we would pick different areas depending on what we wanted to target. Whether we were after Crayfish, whether we were after Oysters, whether we were after Scallops, whether we were after a feed of fish, or whether we just wanted to go and have a look at a different area.

CRAWFORD: These would have been, for the most part, day-trips?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: You’d go someplace, you might stay overnight at a hut or something?

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah.

CRAWFORD: You’d go diving one day, maybe go diving the next day, and then back to work - that kind of thing?

NORTHE: Yeah. And quite often it would be coupled with maybe a hunting trip as well. We’d go and look for Deer somewhere, but we’d also end up having a dive somewhere else as well - or vice versa.

CRAWFORD: So, you’d often be taking your dive gear with you?

NORTHE: Yeah. Lived in a wet suit.

CRAWFORD: Ok. The majority of your dive areas ... obviously for work, it was Big Glory. Did you spend much time diving elsewhere in Paterson Inlet?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: A fair bit?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Scubadiving? Freediving?

NORTHE: Mainly scubadiving. And using scuba for a wee bit of sport.  But then also, when I was helping a Pāua diver, it was all freediving. And we would dive anywhere around, you know, anywhere. We’d go right down to the bottom of the Island if the weather was right - if it was suitable for diving down there. 

CRAWFORD: You said you have direct experience scubadiving around the Titi Islands back in the mid to late 1980s?

NORTHE: Yep, yep, yep.

CRAWFORD: And day-tripping mostly on the northeastern and the southeastern side of Stewart Island. Did you ever get over to Mason's Bay, Doughboy, Codfish?

NORTHE: We dived over here once. That was in response to someone who'd lost some Crayfish pots in a big crevasse thing, and he wanted to see if we could dive down and retrieve some of them.

CRAWFORD: That was back in behind Codfish Island?

NORTHE: Yeah. There’s a big trench that runs through there. Also, Pāua dived all around here.

CRAWFORD: There’s a distinction between being a dinghy boy and being a Pāua diver. You were doing the diving?

NORTHE: As well as dinghy boy. Depending on who I was working for, and what was needed. Some days I’d get grabbed by other divers, "Can you come dinghy boying for us?" So, I would. Other days I’d be off with [Lance??], and then we would go and do our own - we’d both dive, and we’d just tow a dinghy behind us, keep chucking the Pāuas in the dinghy.

CRAWFORD: Right. Would this kind of thing go on year-round, do you figure? Or was there a seasonal pulse in activity?

NORTHE: It's mainly from October on. That’s when the season starts for the Pāua industry.

CRAWFORD: It does now. But back in the '80s, it did then too?

NORTHE: I think it did, yeah. There’s a definite seasonal thing. I mean, they hate diving in wintertime. Water temperatures just ...

CRAWFORD: What does it get down to?

NORTHE: Oh, about 7 degrees. Celsius. And we only had seven weeks or so. In those days, we hadn't got the sort of wetsuits that they’ve got now. It used to get bloody cold.

CRAWFORD: In terms of Pāua diving, it would start to pick up in October?

NORTHE: Well, that’s when the new season starts. There’d be a hiss and a roar if they hadn’t caught all their quota before October came around. Like last year, there’d be quite a bit of activity, and they’d finish off their quota for that particular season. Then new season starts on a certain date. And sometimes they might wait for a few months, depending on the prices overseas. If those prices were good, bang - you’d be into it. You'd try to get as much Pāua as you could.

CRAWFORD: In terms of diving, especially in the region here - immediately associated with Paterson Inlet and the two Bays and the Titi Islands - if you were diving out there, what time of year would most of that have taken place? Not your work diving at the Fish Farm, because that was going to be throughout the year. But your other diving?

NORTHE: I'd say primarily summertime. Or when the water temp was a bit warmer. But also, in the Oyster season, we’d be out here, diving all along in here.

CRAWFORD: So, in front of the two Bays and towards ...

NORTHE: Port William and further norwest.  There’s known Oyster patches along from different areas. So, we'd be off diving down here - 90-odd feet, visibility like that. Massive tide.

CRAWFORD: Let's get back to the visibility - say that again?

NORTHE: Visibility of a couple of feet, if you’re lucky, at times.

CRAWFORD: That’s under certain circumstances. But a diver sees the world very differently than other people. Some people at the surface could think it's good visibility, but sometimes a diver’s going to tell you something very different.

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Was there a seasonality, in terms of the change in visibility of coastal waters along the northeastern side of the Island? Was it clear some parts of the year, and maybe not so clear other times? Or were there some places where it was consistently clear, and other places not?

NORTHE: If you ended up diving after an easterly blow, which comes in here, it can stir up a lot of mud off the bottom, and make the whole water go quite cloudy.

CRAWFORD: In which case, your visibility might be only a couple of metres maybe?

NORTHE: Or less.

CRAWFORD: Or less. I’ve learned a couple of things about your wind since I’ve been coming here. Seems it's typically strong, and it's typically souwest. Under normal circumstances, if you were on the northeastern side of the Island, or amongst the Titi Islands, what can you expect in terms of visibility? Normal circumstances?

NORTHE: Generally, very good visibility. Very good visibility. Maybe 40-50 feet. 60 foot - even more. Just depending on the conditions.

CRAWFORD: Give me a rough idea, over that 15-year period, what was the split between your hours diving in Big Glory - versus your hours diving elsewhere around Stewart Island? Maybe 80-20?

NORTHE: No, it would be 95 to 5.

CRAWFORD: Ok. But that's partly a reflection of just how much diving you were doing for work?

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

CRAWFORD: You were still diving a significant amount of rec diving outside of work?

NORTHE: Yeah.

 CRAWFORD: What was the split then, percentage wise, between rec diving in Paterson Inlet and rec diving elsewhere? Was that a 50-50?

NORTHE: No, it would be more like 80-20.

CRAWFORD: 80 percent in the Inlet?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Ok. That activity pattern then, once you started working on the Fish Farm when you got here - you worked there for a period of time. When did you stop working for the farm?

NORTHE: I did 19 years, and then ended up being the Manager for the last 3 of those 19.

CRAWFORD: You were also diving as Manager?

NORTHE: No, I got the bends probably about four years before I became the Manager.

CRAWFORD: You got the bends while diving at work?

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: How deep did you dive, when you were in Big Glory around the nets?

NORTHE: You predominately working the bottom, underneath the cages. Where we had them, at the time, was 90 foot to the sea floor.

CRAWFORD: Ok, so about three atmospheres.

NORTHE: But we weren’t diving at 90. The bottom of the nets were generally around 60-65 feet.

CRAWFORD: So, two atmospheres?

NORTHE: Yep. And it’s not so much the depth, it was bounce dive profiles - sawtooth profiles. Also, cold water. And doing it day in, day out, day in, day out. We had to do shitloads of diving. We had to do just craploads of diving. We’d get seasonal spatfalls of Blue Mussels, that would absolutely coat the nets. And if you couldn’t get down and clean them, as Mussels grow and grow and grow - and they stretch the nets. They’d get heavier and heavier to the point where we were designing spades, and tying ourselves on, and just scraping huge sheets of Mussels off the sides of nets. Until you had tonnes in the bottom of the net, and the net would be stretching right down 75-80 feet. And you’d make up like a zipper thing. You’d cut the nets and just roll these Mussels out, sew it all back up, until you finished that particular job. And we just had to do this day in and day out. But we also had underwater vacuum cleaning systems for just normal marine foul growth - that grows on the nets. Even though we had the nets anti-fouled, with some horrible formulas. But you still got marine growth at the end of the span, so we’d be underwater vacuum cleaning.

CRAWFORD: Yep. In a given week, how many hours would you have be below the surface at the farm? On average?

NORTHE: We were expected to do one tank a day. When I was getting good at it, I was getting up to an hour and a half out of a scuba tank. But while you’re physically working, it obviously goes down a lot. So, around about an hour or so.

CRAWFORD: That would make 8-10 hours a week, diving?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: You might go down with a couple of tanks on some days?

NORTHE: Yep, yep. But some days you’d try and stay above 33 feet too. You try and tally your jobs. But also, as you know, on marine farms there’s a lot of diving. I remember my profile I had to take up to my dive doctors when I got diagnosed with the bends. I’d done 12 cages, up, down, up, down - 12 times to 60 feet collecting dead fish, and swimming up to the surface, had them on a rope. Pull them up myself, flip-flip, walk to the next cage, push the bins along, dive and go down. 

CRAWFORD: Wow.

NORTHE: One by one, nearly 10 of us at the Salmon Farm got the bends.

CRAWFORD: Things changed after that?

NORTHE: Yes, yes. Changed dramatically.

CRAWFORD: Health and safety ...

NORTHE: They stepped in.

CRAWFORD: But commercial diving was a very different game back then. Very different from regular PADI open-water rec diving.

NORTHE: Oh, yeah.

CRAWFORD: The training, the precautions, the reporting, the medicals - everything.

NORTHE: There was always the '60 feet, 60 minutes' - don’t go beyond that. Whatever you did work-wise, inside that 60 minutes, didn’t come into it. It was just 60 feet.

CRAWFORD: That was back in the day?

NORTHE: Back in the day. PADI openwater.

CRAWFORD: When did you get bent?

NORTHE: Like I say, about four years before I left the farm.

CRAWFORD: So 1993? Roughly?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: You recuperated. But then when you came back, you came back in a management capacity?

NORTHE: I was Assistant Manager when I got the bends.

CRAWFORD: But you had also been Dive Manager before. When you came back, I presume that you did not dive again - after the bends?

NORTHE: No. But, I was allowed to dive again. In my own head, I didn’t think it was what I wanted to do.

CRAWFORD: I think that was the right decision.

NORTHE: I think so too.

CRAWFORD: Anyways, you were still in a management capacity come 1994-1995?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Did getting the bends curtail your non-work underwater experiences overall? Were you still doing any freediving?

NORTHE: No.

CRAWFORD: You were basically out of the water?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Ok. So, 1997 is an important breakpoint then. Prior to, and after.

NORTHE: Yes. It also coincides with a marriage breakdown. It also coincides with a mid-life crisis, if you believe in that sort of thing.

CRAWFORD: Been through it. So, I happen to believe in it - yeah. From the time you got here, roughly 1988, to the time that you were out of the water in 1993 - was it pretty much a consistent pattern through there? Or was there anything else that we haven’t talked about that happened, in terms of location or activities that would have affected your time on the water in this region?

NORTHE: No, it was pretty consistent.

CRAWFORD: Ok. You returned to the Salmon Farm for about three years. And then you say goodbye to aquaculture?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: What happened then?

NORTHE: Right around that time was my marriage breakup, and also just stressed out so bad, and trying to run the farm - all the behind the scenes, going on. That was just sort of devastating to my head, I just couldn’t handle that. I needed to just step back, and work things out. So I took almost a year off.

CRAWFORD: Were you doing anything significant on or around the water, during that time away?

NORTHE: No.

CRAWFORD: When you came back after that, what did you start doing then?

NORTHE: I think it's important to say, I didn’t leave the Island as such. My house was always here. I managed to buy my house off my ex-Wife. But then I went on holidays up the West Coast, and stayed with good friends like for months at a time.

CRAWFORD: Up in Fiordland?

NORTHE: No, Ōkārito. West Coast. Did lots of hunting trips, lots of things. I went back home, saw my Parents, other friends back in Napier. Just basically cruised for a year or two, till I found my feet again. I was always back and forth to the Island, and then I started working for Phil Smith. Doing the Kiwi guiding.

CRAWFORD: That would have been 2000? Maybe 2001?

NORTHE: I've been working for Phil for the last seven years.

CRAWFORD: So, more like 2008.

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Ok. So, a little bit of back and forth - but starting 2008, you began a new phase when you were spending a fair amount of time on the water around Stewart Island again?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Was the time that you were spending on the water, principally getting people from a to b, in terms of the Kiwi spotting? Or were you running charters generally? What were your activities over the past seven years working with Phillip? 

NORTHE: We have a typical tourist season here. It starts around about October, and finishes about April. Virtually every night October through to April, we do Kiwi tours over to Ocean Beach.

CRAWFORD: That would be a shuttle leaving Halfmoon Bay?

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: Or leaving Golden Bay?

NORTHE: Leaving Halfmoon Bay, mainly.

CRAWFORD: And then going outside, around and then into Paterson Inlet?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Where do you moor or anchor?

NORTHE: We come into Little Glory.

CRAWFORD: So, you come in through Paterson Inlet, then Little Glory Bay?

NORTHE: Yeah, into Little Glory, tie off at the jetty, walk across the tiny peninsula or isthmus. 

CRAWFORD: To Ocean Beach?

NORTHE: To Ocean Beach, and we search for Kiwis along the beach, generally.

CRAWFORD: That is an evening trip?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: So, on the way over, its nine-ish - starting to get dark?

NORTHE: Depending on the year, we sort of leave half an hour before dark. That time changes dramatically through the year. Like, right at the moment, we're leaving at quarter to nine - nine o’clock at night, to get there at halfpast nine, to be dark about ten.

CRAWFORD: Come back in another couple a months, you’ll be leaving at eight?

NORTHE: We’ll be leaving mainly at seven o’clock. The 21st of December is the longest day here.

CRAWFORD: The actual time of day changes, but you’re always heading over to be there for dark?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: So, you’re arriving at the dusk side of things, consistently. When you’re in the tourist season. Are there any other kind of activities on or around the water during tourist season? Or is that principally it?

NORTHE: That's the main one. But we also do pelagic tours out right round the front of the Islands here. Especially if you want to see all the Albatross, the Yellow-Eyed Penguins, [Skuas??], and other associated seabirds. We do a lot of pelagics around here. We also do hunter dropoffs and pickups. We'll pick up hunters from Halfmoon Bay and take them anywhere down the shore here as far as Lords River. There’s Māori blocks, all the way through there, hunting blocks. Sometimes we’ll go up as far as Yankee River. 

CRAWFORD: So, not as far west as the Ruggedys? Not as far as Codfish?

NORTHE: No.

CRAWFORD: Roughly, what is the percentage of effort - between the Kiwi charters, the pelagic charters, and the hunter charters?

NORTHE: Mostly Kiwi; 90 percent of it is Kiwis, and the other are ...

CRAWFORD: 5 and 5?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Ok. Outside of the tourist season, what are your activities on or around the water?

NORTHE: I’ve got my own boat here. My partner who I'm with now, we love going fishing, we love hunting. She loves catching fish, we love eating it.

CRAWFORD: Where do you go fishing?

NORTHE: Mainly in Paterson Inlet.

CRAWFORD: I forgot to ask you this before, when we were talking about the earlier days ... you were all over the place, doing all sorts of things.

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: You were scubadiving, you were spearfishing, you were Pāua diving. I didn’t ask you if you went line fishing or anything like that, back in the day?

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: When you did do linefishing back in the day, where did you go?

NORTHE: Mainly the Inlet, but also outside of the Inlet. This was our play area around here.

CRAWFORD: So, basically from Port William towards the northeast of the Island.

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Including the Titi Islands?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: But Paterson Inlet’s protected, so it doesn’t matter what the conditions are ...

NORTHE: It's a great place. You can go anywhere.

CRAWFORD: I don’t think I remember you saying anything about kayaking or anything like that. Did you do any of that?

NORTHE: No, no.

CRAWFORD: All right. That brings us up to today, because your last eight years have been fairly consistent, in terms of where and what you’ve been doing. Yes?

NORTHE: Yeah.

2. EXPOSURE TO MĀORI/LOCAL/SCIENCE KNOWLEDGE SYSTEMS

CRAWFORD: How much do you think that Māori culture and knowledge has affected your thinking about marine ecology in general, including the White Pointers? Very Low, Low, Medium, High, Very High?

NORTHE: Medium to High.

CRAWFORD: What do you think is one of the major ways that Māori culture has come in? Is it individual people, is it just simply living in this community? Or is it certain events or certain special things?

NORTHE: All of those. I’ve got no Māori blood in me, but I strongly associate with them. I do a lot of carving, so a lot of people think I’m Māori, but I’m not. And I hold some of their spiritual values quite close to my own. I feel a certain affinity with them. Certain areas of this Island have got very, very strong Māori presence, that I believe I can feel. So yes. It's all very important.

CRAWFORD: Thank you for that.

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Same question for Science. To what extent has Science affected your understanding about the marine world, and the animals like the White Pointers that live in it?

NORTHE: Very High.

CRAWFORD: And why do you say that?

NORTHE: Probably through my experience working on the Salmon Farms, and needing to know Science names, know what was going on underwater, needing to understand lots of different aspects of the operations.

CRAWFORD: Fair enough. As well as your advanced training in scuba?

NORTHE: Yeah, well ... and all sorts of things.

3. WHITE POINTER DISTRIBUTION AND ABUNDANCE

CRAWFORD: What was the first time that you remember hearing about or seeing a White Pointer? When did they show up on your radar screen, in any way?

NORTHE: You’re going to have to blame the film 'Jaws'.

CRAWFORD: Really?

NORTHE: Yeah, probably. I was aware of Sharks, obviously. It gets taught to you in school as part of our fishes in the sea. But 'Jaws' really made it, for everybody in the world, I think.

CRAWFORD: That movie has, without surprise, shown up in several of the interviews, as being a major factor. Not just a North American phenomenon. And you were one of them?

NORTHE: Yeah. But I think we naturally, as Humans, recognize an apex predator. Whether it be under the water or on land. Even if we’re not taught, I think we would sort of know, somehow. Especially if we were preyed upon by those animals. Particularly Sharks, or Lions or something else.

CRAWFORD: But in that regard, you might think there are other kinds of Sharks that are also associated with attacks and fatalities.

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Tiger Shark is right up there, Bull Shark is right up there.

NORTHE: Yeah. I think just the word 'Shark' ... it doesn’t have to be Great White or Bull or Tiger on it. We used to scare the living crap out of my friend’s Sister, water skiing on the lake, and yelling out "Shark!" to her.

CRAWFORD: In a freshwater lake?

NORTHE: In a freshwater later. And she would just be ... [laughs]

CRAWFORD: Ok. Let’s go back to Hawkes Bay for a bit, back to your time around Napier. When you saw the 'Jaws' movie, did it change your behaviour? Did you do anything differently as a result?

NORTHE: No.

CRAWFORD: It was just there.

NORTHE: Yep. It was just in your head.

CRAWFORD: And when you were in the water, after 'Jaws' in the 1970s, you knew you were in a place where White Pointers swim?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Were you more aware while swimming, after the movie?

NORTHE: I’ve always have a bit of a fear of what I can’t see when I’ve been in the water. But I don’t like Eels either.

CRAWFORD: Have you had an experience with Eels in the water?

NORTHE: No, no. it's totally irrational. But it's just one of those things. I love looking at them, but whenever I’m in the water around Eels, whether it be seawater or freshwater Eels ...

CRAWFORD: What about Seals or Sea Lions? Ever have any underwater encounters with them?

NORTHE: Oh yeah, at the Salmon Farm.

CRAWFORD: As a kid, I’m talking about now.

NORTHE: Not as a kid, no. Napier, it had - well, it still has - a Marineland, with Dolphins and Sea Lions and things. We found a way of sneaking in there at night and go swimming with the Dolphins. 

[both laugh heartily] 

NORTHE: It was just fantastic. You do this - and they'd all go streaking, and leap over you, and they’d take the ball, and they’d come up and you’d ride on their fins. We just had some awesome times with Dolphins and things. But I remember, it was nighttime - this was in the days were there wasn’t any cameras or anything like that, and security was pretty lax ... we heard about this from some other kids, so that's why we had to go and try it. I remember, we’d just strip off with the jocks and go swimming with them. But moving back to this other case, it happened to be a big Sea Lion. We didn’t realize it was in there, and it kind of came flopping up beside us - ready for its fish, or whatever it thought it was doing. You know, this big black thing appears beside you. Fuck.

[both laugh again]

CRAWFORD: In general, Napier ... had other people warned you about White Pointers off the beach? Where you were swimming?

NORTHE: Not really, no.

CRAWFORD: It wasn’t really identified as an important thing?

NORTHE: No.

CRAWFORD: Was there a Surf Life Saving Club in Napier back in the day?

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: When they were there on the beach, amongst their different responsibilities, they watch to see if somebody’s in distress or somebody’s a bad swimmer, or somebody has a heart attack, or whatever - but they’re also supposed to be monitoring for Sharks?

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah.

CRAWFORD: But my understanding is that there are some clubs that just don’t have any Shark reports at all. Even though they’re looking. 

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Do you ever remember a Shark alarm, or anybody telling everybody to get out of the water because there was a Shark there?

NORTHE: No, no.

CRAWFORD: Do you ever remember hearing anybody seeing Sharks at Napier? Did you ever see Sharks out there?

NORTHE: One of my schoolmates, we’d go around to his parent's place to play ... He was one of the world's leading Whale and Dolphin experts at the time, a guy called Frank Robson. He had like two sheds dedicated to amazing marine biology stuff - amazing stuff. But he also had a couple of good Shark jaws in there, which he said that were caught off Hawkes Bay by a fisherman. And he ended up with the jaws, or maybe he was one of the fishermen, I don’t know. So, I can definitely remember those big Shark jaws.

CRAWFORD: Which means, maybe White Pointers were around Napier?

NORTHE: They were there. But as I'm aware, they never came into the surf beach. The dangerous thing in the Hawke’s Bay was the rips.

CRAWFORD: Yeah.

NORTHE: That's where people died.

CRAWFORD: That’s why they monitor swimmers between the flags.

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: It’s a bit of an aside, but did you see in the news about three weeks ago - there was a White Pointer that got wrapped up in a Codpotter's lines up in Hawkes Bay?

NORTHE: No.

CRAWFORD: Big fish too.

CRAWFORD: They unwound it, and off it went. 

NORTHE: Choice.

CRAWFORD: Ok. When you came here to Stewart Island, in your early 20s - what was the first time that you saw, or heard about, White Pointers here?

NORTHE: I suppose when I was being taught to scubadive, it would have been a natural question - although I can’t remember asking it - about the Sharks.

CRAWFORD: But that was Big Glory Bay?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: And your diving was very specific to the pens?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: But you took that diving experience, and you recreationally dove widely - at least around the northeast and eastern coast of Stewart Island?

NORTHE: Yep, yep.

CRAWFORD: When you were diving outside of Big Glory Bay, did anybody tell you about, or speak of, the White Pointers?

NORTHE: I’d heard stories about the Sharks that go around Codfish. That this is almost like a 'Shark Alley'. So, that was one area, even though I’ve dived there, we were always wary of. That had that sort of taboo sort of thing around there.

CRAWFORD: That was true in your early days?

NORTHE: Yes. More so the early days. I don’t know about now.

CRAWFORD: When you were 24, 25 years old. That Codfish Island was known to be a Sharky region?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Interesting that you used the word 'taboo'. Does that mean that people avoided diving there - around Codfish? 

NORTHE: Or would be very careful, if they were diving there.

CRAWFORD: Ok.

NORTHE: I’ve heard a story where a guy was Pāua diving away, and half a Seal just floated past - with blood coming out.

CRAWFORD: A very fresh hit?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Couldn’t have been fresher.

NORTHE: Yeah. The Shark, he didn’t see it - but, there’s a dead Seal, with entrails and blood going everywhere, They got out of the water straight away.

CRAWFORD: You heard about that back in the day?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: So, that was an older story?

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah. Ron Dennis.

CRAWFORD: Ok. In your early days, leading up to when you got out of the water permanently in 1994 ... to me, that’s important because your diving experience was all before the Shark cage diving.

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: In that period of time, when you were still on or in the water, did you ever see any White Pointers?

NORTHE: No, no. I saw them, but not while I was diving.

CRAWFORD: I meant when you were either on or in the water.

NORTHE: Oh, sorry. Yeah.

CRAWFORD: But you never saw any White Pointers while you were diving in Big Glory Bay for work, or elsewhere around northeast Stewart Island for fun? For the rec diving that you did inside Paterson Inlet, and a variety of places outside the Inlet - including Codfish Island - you never saw any White Pointers as a diver?

NORTHE: No, no.

CRAWFORD: What do you know about the incidents that led up to the deployment of Joe Cave's Shark nets in the Bays? How is it that anybody knew that they were going to deploy the nets in the first place? Had Sharks been seen?

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah. That's my understanding

CRAWFORD: Did you hear anything about how they had been seen, or by whom?

NORTHE: No. Not with any reliability, no

CRAWFORD: Ok. Did you get the sense that it was a community-based practice - that if the Sharks come into the bays, they have gone out of their domain and come into ours. That it’s removal of a threat?

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: Did you get the sense, that within the community that generally that was the thinking of most people?

NORTHE: I got the sense from living here, that every Shark, where possible, was killed.

CRAWFORD: Back in the day.

NORTHE: Back in the day. Shot, netted, or caught on a hook. I’ve seen some massive, big Shark hooks being made. We bought Shark hooks ourselves at the Salmon Farm, to try and catch some of our problem Sharks - when we had those Porbeagles. So, it was a definite thing, an accepted practice.

CRAWFORD: So, Big Glory Bay was similar to Horseshoe Bay and Halfmoon Bay. In the sense that - big Sharks come in, up go the anti-Shark devices?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Halfmoon and Horseshoe are a little bit different, though. Because, as you mentioned before, there’s no real kind of permanent human settlement around Big Glory.

NORTHE: No.

CRAWFORD: But you’ve got people living and bathing and boating all around Horsehoe and Halfmoon.

NORTHE: Yeah, it’s a great place. It’s got wakeboarders, boaters, boarders, and waterskiers, and children learning to swim, and moms and children. So, that perception is - "If there are Sharks there, no we don’t want them."

CRAWFORD: And if they come into the Bay, then out go the nets?

NORTHE: But this was before they were protected.

CRAWFORD: RIght. I completely get that. Do you remember when the White Pointers got protected?

NORTHE: No. It's not been that long, And since then, its noticeable how much they’ve turned up.

CRAWFORD: Since we’re talking about those Bays - HalfMoon and Horseshoe ...

NORTHE: Yeah, and you’ve also got to include Deadman’s, which is right in between - where a lot of the boats will hang around there, and fillet their fish.

CRAWFORD: You're bringing in something really important - let's hold on to that for a minute.

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Do you remember if there were Shark nets prior to Joe Cave? Or were people using some other form of anti-Shark methods?

NORTHE: I’ve heard of other fishermen talking about it.

CRAWFORD: About nets?

NORTHE: Yes, but not targeting Sharks. Targeting Greenbone, or Butterfish. And as a consequence, Shark swims in, gets tangled and dies.

CRAWFORD: In terms of targeting White Pointers, did you ever hear anything about people using baited hooks on drums, or anything like that? Or was that before your day?

NORTHE: I’ve heard [Alan Dawson??] talk about them putting a 44-gallon drum on the end of the Halfmoon Bay wharf, and catching a big White. It pulled two or three drums off the wharf - off and gone.

CRAWFORD: Wow. And then it just bent the hook? What happened to the drums?

NORTHE: It towed them away.

CRAWFORD: They were just gone?

NORTHE: Yeah. They tried to follow them, and never did find them. [laughs[

CRAWFORD: These are big drums.

NORTHE: These are big fish.

CRAWFORD: That was Tim Dawson's Dad, telling you that story?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Ok. So, this would have been back in the day, maybe when?

NORTHE: Oh, I suppose either the '50s or '60s. Something like that. There’s so many stories over the years, and yeah. Until somebody like you actually forces you to actually think of them all, and try and make sense of it and put them together.

CRAWFORD: And then start sifting through to figure them out.

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah.

CRAWFORD: We’ll never know for sure, but we might see some patterns.

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: In terms of the Bays, then, have you ever seen live White Pointers in Horseshoe or Halfmoon?

NORTHE: No.

CRAWFORD: What other stories have you heard of for White Pointers in the Bays? Incidences, observations or otherwise?

NORTHE: Well, there’s just been quite a lot of observations all around this area, in the last few years. Especially at Deadman’s, but that's probably because of the fisherman coming in there. But also around Deadman’s, a lot of people fish in and around these areas, or they've gone out to - maybe not necessarily out on the Islands ...

CRAWFORD: We’ll get to the Titi Islands in a second. But you brought up Deadman’s Beach, or Deadman's Bay. What was the first time you remember hearing people talk about White Pointers in that bay?

NORTHE: I think I’ve just about always heard about White Sharks in that bay.

CRAWFORD: So, back to your earliest time, when you came here?

NORTHE: It's always been a known spot. Because the fisherman go in there to clean their fish.

CRAWFORD: And was it that association from the get-go? White Pointers there, because it’s a fish cleaning station?

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah.

CRAWFORD: As far back as you know?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Have you ever been to Deadman’s Bay, and seen White Pointers there?

NORTHE: No. I’ve been to Deadman’s plenty of times, and never seen one.

CRAWFORD: Been there boating? Or diving?

NORTHE: Boating. And also working on the [track??] up above Deadman’s Beach.

CRAWFORD: Ok - so, on boats but also land-based?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Did you ever dive there?

NORTHE: I’ve never dived there, no. I’ve dived very close to it - just right on the Horseshoe Point. I’ve dived around here for Crayfish.

CRAWFORD: Winter or summer?

NORTHE: Summer.

CRAWFORD: Was there ever any indication from the dive community here, that there are places that you dive - and places that you don’t dive? Or during particular seasons?

NORTHE: No, no. We dived in whatever place we knew there was a good chance of getting the target fish or species that we were after. Whether they be Oysters, you go to a specific area for Oysters. Or Crayfish, if you want to get a good Cray. Oysters around here. Scallops have always been in the Inlet - but it’s closed down now except for Big Glory Bay. But once upon a time, we could dive anywhere for Scallops. So, you went to the particular areas, for different things.

CRAWFORD: For your target species.

NORTHE: Right.

CRAWFORD: What I’m trying to get my head wrapped around though is, you had talked before, about diving on the backside of Codfish.

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: That it was ... you used that word 'taboo'.

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: But it wasn’t the case over here around the Bays or the Inlet, or even the Titi Islands. It wasn’t that same type of thing - that you don’t go diving there, or you don’t go diving here during certain times of the year. It didn’t translate to be the same kind of taboo around here?

NORTHE: I wouldn’t go diving there, or swim past there for Oysters if there was a fishing boat cleaning its bloody catch there.

CRAWFORD: Fair enough. But even if the boat wasn’t there ... There just doesn't seem to be the same sense of 'taboo places' or 'taboo times'. And I don’t mean to over-inflate the Codfish Island example. 

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Right. Let's get back to the cleaning station at Deadman's. Of all of the places, within proximity of Halfmoon Bay or Horseshoe Bay, was Deadman's the most common fish cleaning station? As far as you were aware? Or were there other places where people were cleaning their fish?

NORTHE: Well, they would clean anywhere inside Halfmoon Bay as well - depending on which wind and things. Deadman’s is a nice easy little bay, before you come in.

CRAWFORD: And it's close, but it's not right next to everybody's home. Well, there's the one place right there. 

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah. But I’ve seen them cleaning fish out here as well you know.

CRAWFORD: Drifting? Or anchored?

NORTHE: Drifting.

CRAWFORD: Several people have talked about cleaning fish while on autopilot or whatever - on the way back to port.

NORTHE: Yep, yep.

CRAWFORD: And if they weren’t quite done cleaning ...

NORTHE: They’d stop in here.

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: But from the get-go, there was always an association between the fish cleaning stations and the White Pointers?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Did anybody ever tell you about directly seeing White Pointers at these cleaning stations?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Did they describe the behaviour of the White Pointers that would map out to our Level 1, Level 2, Level 3, Level 4? Were they just observations, or were they drive-bys, or were the animals showing some interest, or were they having attitude?

NORTHE: Showing some interest. Swimming around the boat, showing some interest.

CRAWFORD: Circling?

NORTHE: Yep. And maybe eating up the Cod frames ...

CRAWFORD: Did people actually observe them eating the Cod frames?

NORTHE: I don’t know.

CRAWFORD: Ok. At the fish cleaning stations, did anyone receive any attitude from these White Pointers?

NORTHE: No, I don’t think so.

CRAWFORD: Were they showing aggression, or predatory behaviour of any kind?

NORTHE: I know one or two of the boats here had been mouthed by a Shark.

CRAWFORD: Mouthed on the bow, the rudder, the stern? That type of thing?

NORTHE: Yeah. I don’t know whether they were cleaning fish at the time. But I know one of them was actually catching fish, but I don’t know if they were cleaning fish.

CRAWFORD: Right. Any other places around the Bays that received as much cleaning effort as Deadman's? Was there any other place that was also very frequent - in terms of fish cleaning?

NORTHE: Yeah. You’ve got the fish shed ...

CRAWFORD: We’re talking right here at the Halfmoon Bay wharf?

NORTHE: Yeah. You’ve got holes going through the floor where they’re washing down little bits of food and things - falling into the tide and away.

CRAWFORD: Is that still happening?

NORTHE: I don’t know if it’s still. I haven’t worked in there a year or two. But it used to. And also, there’s another fish shed over at Horseshoe Bay.

CRAWFORD: Right. Same kind of thing?

NORTHE: They mainly process, these days, Crayfish - live Crayfish. So they have big tanks and things there. I don’t think it’s the same there.

CRAWFORD: I would imagine most of the Cod frames ... they're dispensed with either offshore, on the way back to port - or at Deadman's or whatever. So, you’re not necessarily getting a load of the frames that are being generated at the fish shed here at the Halfmoon Bay wharf. But they still have that kind of floor dump, into the water, immediately below the fish shed?

NORTHE: Well, it’s all changed now too. With the system of cleaning fish and so on. They do it all in the shed now, where our guys wouldn’t be cleaning Cod - they’d be probably just gilling, or just bleeding, or something like that. Or bang into the shed. The way I understand it, that practice is largely sort of slowly stopping now.

CRAWFORD: Which practice in particular?

NORTHE: Of cleaning Cod out there on the water. When they’d be doing their own fillets on the back of the boat.

CRAWFORD: Right. But now the fish are coming in ...

NORTHE: Whole Cod.

CRAWFORD: Well, they’d be bled - I think - out there?

NORTHE: As soon as they catch them out of the pots, into the bin, into the shed.

CRAWFORD: So, the generation of Cod frames now takes place at the fish shed?

NORTHE: Yep, yep.

CRAWFORD: Do you have any understanding of what happens to the Cod frames that are generated at the shed?

NORTHE: Yes. it used to be part of my job, at one stage, to take them from the shed by boat - and dump them anywhere out here.

CRAWFORD: You did that on a barge or something?

NORTHE: On a fish boat

CRAWFORD: On a fishing boat?

NORTHE: Yep. And there was no designated spot.

CRAWFORD: Was this a regulated activity that Environment Southland or somebody was in charge of? "These are the rules"?

NORTHE: No, hell no.

CRAWFORD: This was just best practice?

NORTHE: Yeah. And now I believe they take them out ... we’ve even used them, we’ll go and get the skins and some of the frames, and we'll take them on the back of our boat - go and do a pelagic trip around here. Use them to bring the seabirds in.

CRAWFORD: Yes, and I’ve heard about that too. I forgot to ask you something when we were talking about your experiences at Big Glory. You had mortalities as a casual employee, Assistant Manager, Manager of the operation. At different times of the year, those operations generate a substantial volume of morts - mortalities - that have to be disposed of. 

NORTHE: Oh, yeah. Ten tonne a day, 

CRAWFORD: Ten tonne a day? Of mortalities?

NORTHE: Up to, yeah. When the mature fish die off, you can get up to ten ton a day. That's a lot of fish.

CRAWFORD: You started roughly four years after the fish farms opened up?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: My understanding is that there was a change in mortality disposal.

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: What was it like to begin with? What kinds of disposal practices - where and when and how?

NORTHE: We used plastic wheelie bins. They're what, 200 and something litre bins, or so.

CRAWFORD: Are these like ...

NORTHE: Like you see everywhere.

CRAWFORD: Like the yellow recycling bins?

NORTHE: Yeah - with the wheels.

CRAWFORD: Ok.

NORTHE: So, we used big bins like that. It wouldn’t be anything to fill up a dozen of those a day, with dead fish.

CRAWFORD: Ok.

NORTHE: And in my day, we would dump them anywhere outside the mouth of Big Glory, but mainly in the big hole at Ulva. Along with one previous Manager that I had, we cut up unbelievable amounts of old cages, and tipped it all overboard there.

CRAWFORD: There would be a seasonal pulse to that volume?

NORTHE: Yep, yep.

CRAWFORD: It would be mostly when? What part of the year?

NORTHE: Round about March time. Just before the winter comes, March-April.

CRAWFORD: That's the peak. But throughout the year, even when it was low, it might be like one or two wheelie bins a day?

NORTHE: Yeah. But we also had some very bad Jellyfish strikes. And we would lose whole cages of fish.

CRAWFORD: You’d have these episodes of mass mortality?

NORTHE: 45,000 dead Salmon. 

CRAWFORD: Wow. And Blue Green Algae - I hear there was one year when they just wiped out everything.

NORTHE: '89-'90. That was just incredible.

CRAWFORD: On a scale not seen before?

NORTHE: No.

CRAWFORD: The mort dumping off the east side of Ulva, back in the day. That was kind of normal standard practice - but then it changed at some point in time?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Do you remember when it changed?

NORTHE: Yeah - I changed it.

CRAWFORD: What?

NORTHE: I changed it. I forced my bosses to stop dumping here ...

CRAWFORD: At Ulva?

NORTHE: Yeah. And try and get out somewhere in the Straits.

CRAWFORD: Why did you do that?

NORTHE: Because I realized it was just such a pig of a thing to do. It was a horrible thing. And my particular bosses at the time, they didn’t want to waste anybody’s time going way out here. Petrol, and time.

CRAWFORD: Going way out where?

NORTHE: Out in the Straits, to dump the dead fish. So, I started pushing and pushing it. Making them realize that if we didn’t do something, "I might say something to the wrong people, and you’ll be looked at very, very hard." As a consequence, we actually applied for, and got, a site somewhere ... I can’t remember where it is now. Probably out here somewhere.

CRAWFORD: Out behind the Titi Islands?

NORTHE: Yeah. It was notified, it was put through the paper. People had their right to make submissions for or against.

CRAWFORD: Yeah, yeah.

NORTHE: I think there was a spot somewhere around here that everyone kind of pretty much agreed on.

CRAWFORD: Where is "here"?

NORTHE: Somewhere in there.

CRAWFORD: I’m trying to figure this out - maybe two kilometres east of the Mutton Bird Islands, the Titi Island chain?

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah.

CRAWFORD: When was this - the change?

NORTHE: The big supply vessel, in my day, was Explorer Douglas - the boat. We would load them all onto the back of the boat. We had a big huge alloy bin-mate, a specially designed alloy bin with a big holding capacity. You could open up a gate at the bottom, and it would all flood out. And as you know, if you’ve been around Salmon farms, what dead Salmon smell of. Fucking awful smell. So they would steam out there, on their way home to Bluff, to unload all the harvest fish - and they would dump the dead Salmon on the way, at this particular designated site.

CRAWFORD: Do you remember, who the regulating authority was then for that?

NORTHE: Environment Southland, I'd say. It was a long process. I just hated this idea of dumping things in my own backyard. I’ve come to love this area passionately. It just goes against the grain to be dumping them there.

And, as well as attracting unwanted things into here. Whether that be Sharks, or disease, or anything.

CRAWFORD: Or even just the nutrients that are released from the fish carcasses? That kind of thing?

NORTHE: Yeah. It's bad enough with what goes on up inside Big Glory Bay.

CRAWFORD: When was it, that you worked your bosses hard on this dumping issue?

NORTHE: Well, while I was Manager - in my last three years. So, that would be '96-'97, I suppose. I was a bastard to them. I was a real thorn in their side. And I think they were quite happy when I actually handed in my notice. In one part. [both laugh] And I didn’t actually like putting them out there either ...

CRAWFORD: "Out there", meaning east of the Titi Islands?

NORTHE: Yeah. We investigated land burial. We investigated the use of massive big furnaces to actually make it down to a powder, and turn it into a fertilizer. Try and resell it. We used to give it away to garden centres -  if they wanted it, they could come pick it up. But who wants to deal with it? Sloppy, dead rotting ...

CRAWFORD: My understanding, and I might be wrong on this one, but my understanding is that now, there is actually very little dumping of morts from the Fish Farms. Whatever is coming out as waste product is going back to Bluff, and being converted into fertilizer or whatever, there.

NORTHE: And I hope they are doing that

CRAWFORD: I think everyone would support that.

NORTHE: But I saw them last year, still dumping fish out there. You can smell it. A smell all over the ocean. A horrible, putrid, bloody smell. And it lasts for years. When we had the Algae bloom up here ...

CRAWFORD: In Big Glory?

NORTHE: Yeah. One of the farms ... we had lots of divers on our farm - this was one of the competitors' farms, they had only a limited number of divers. And they’d burnt themselves out. One guy, a whole cage of dead fish, virtually a whole cage, absolutely bulging nets at the bottom ... this guy swims up underneath the net with a big sharp knife and goes burrrrrrrrrr - and dumped a hundred and something tonne of dead fish underneath the cages right there. And for years and years and years, you’d get this seepage coming up to the surface in a bit of a slick. That kind of horrible smell of dead fish. Big Glory doesn’t have a big tidal exchange, you know. That's it's mouth. So, there’s very little tidal exchange through there. 

CRAWFORD: And that was years afterward, that you were still feeling the influence?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: We already talked about White Pointers responding to fish cleaning stations. Do you think the White Pointers respond to the discharge from the fish sheds?

NORTHE: I would think a Shark would come into Halfmoon Bay, and have a bit of a smell around, But I don’t think they come in on a daily basis as part of their food requirements. Because I don’t think they’d get enough food. In terms of what’s actually going out from the fish shed floor.

CRAWFORD: It's more like a berley trail there?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: It’s not potentially a feeding station - like Deadman's?

NORTHE: And I wouldn’t doubt that the odd one comes in - that can follow that berley trail as you call it, and has a sniff around, and swims back out, and knows there’s not really anything there to eat. It's just a trail. It might have been something, but not anymore. 

CRAWFORD: Do you think that the volume, historically, or now, of a, discharge from the fish sheds - would be at a level that it might actually form a trail that a White Pointer would detect and respond to?

NORTHE: In the old days, I think it would have been, yes. I don’t believe that there’s that much now. But I was there the other night, and there was clearly water coming out from underneath the floor.

CRAWFORD: Sure, the fish shed's still in operation.

NORTHE: It's probably just a clean-up - they have to do a massive amount of cleaning, water analysed, and listeria tests, and blah blah blah. And it goes on and on.

CRAWFORD: Yep. And, don’t get me wrong. I'm just trying to get a sense of what the context is. Because the White Pointers are responding to the everything, right?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Ok, lets pull off this chart, so we’re back to Rakiura.

NORTHE: Yup.

CRAWFORD: In general, when you take a look at this chart, you consider the region: Foveaux Strait, the south end of the South Island, Rakiura as a whole, with all of the associated islands. When you think about White Pointer hotspots - aggregations - where are the places you think of? 

NORTHE: Obviously here ...

CRAWFORD: So, Titi Islands and out in front of Paterson Inlet and the two bays.

NORTHE: And obviously anecdotally from fishermen, they swim through here.

CRAWFORD: Codfish Island.

NORTHE: I've never heard of any stories of them being around down in the south. But it wouldn’t surprise me if we started getting more and more up around this area, because the Seals are breeding up now.

CRAWFORD: Right.

NORTHE: We haven’t really touched on the Seals ...

CRAWFORD: We’ll get to Seal in just a second. Right now, I’m just looking for your knowledge of White Pointer aggregations.

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: What about out in Foveaux Strait, and the coastline up along the south end of South Island. Are there any places you know of, where aggregations of White Pointers have been reported?

NORTHE: No. Except to say that the surfers do see Sharks in various places.

CRAWFORD: White Pointers, or Sharks in general?

NORTHE: Sharks in general. And there’s obviously places where the Seal colonies are starting to appear. The way I think things is, we're probably going to get sightings along the Catlin’s coast, partly because of the Seals.

CRAWFORD: All right. When you think about the northern tip of Stewart Island, including Codfish, and also off the Bays and Paterson Inlet, and further out to the Titi Islands - is there a seasonality to the White Pointer aggregations? Or are they there year-round, do you figure?

NORTHE: No, it's definitely seasonal.

CRAWFORD: How would you describe the seasonality?

NORTHE: From December through to about May, May-June ... and maybe it's water temperature related, as well as it’s the Seal pups.

CRAWFORD: Ok. You’ve kind of anticipated the next question which is - why the seasonality? Let’s talk about temperature first. How do you think temperature might affect White Pointer distribution and abundance?

NORTHE: You’d have to talk to a Scientist. [laughs]

CRAWFORD: I’m sorry. I really was talking like a Scientist there. I didn’t mean to. Why do you think the Sharks give a damn about water temperature?

NORTHE: I don’t know. It’s obviously something in the physiology of the fish.

CRAWFORD: Something about warmer temperatures and their preference for it? You think that White Pointers have a preference for warmer temperatures?

NORTHE: Yes, yes I do. And a lot of this is because we’re getting bombarded on tv constantly by Discovery Channel, Shark Week, Shark Alley and whatever.

CRAWFORD: Yes. And sometimes its sensational, and sometimes there’s a bit of useful information in there.

NORTHE: Yes, yes.

CRAWFORD: Ok. Let’s go to the Seals. What do you think the association is between the Seals and the White Pointers?

NORTHE: Well, I think it’s a seasonal food source.

CRAWFORD: The adult Seals, or the Seal pups? Or both?

NORTHE: Both.

CRAWFORD: Where are the Seal colonies, the major aggregations of Seals, around Stewart Island?

NORTHE: The biggest are the Titi Islands. But there's also Seal colonies starting to establish around Paterson Inlet. We used to have a tagging program on the Seals. When I was on the Salmon Farm, I tried to get a permit to shoot problem re-offending Seals. They made me jump through bells and hoops and whistles to prove that we had problem re-offending Seals. So, we ended up proving that we did, and they said that we didn’t, even though we caught one Seal 24 times.

CRAWFORD: Who is "they"?

NORTHE: Whoever's responsible. Department of Conservation, for one. And also ... who's the marine mammal ... we had to get a Scientist to come down and teach us how to put a tag in a Seal flipper. Cattle tag,  green or yellow.

CRAWFORD: Scientist - do you remember from where?

NORTHE: Oh, what’s his name now? 

CRAWFORD: Or where he's from?

NORTHE: He’s a New Zealand chap. But I think he had an accent.

CRAWFORD: An academic? 

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: Ok. But definitely, you're talking Seal colonies out around the Titi Islands ...

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: And increasingly in and around Paterson Inlet?

NORTHE: In and around Patterson Inlet. But also, I’m seeing more Seals around the shore here now. More than what we’ve seen for a long time.

CRAWFORD: On the east side of Stewart Island?

NORTHE: Yeah. They’re developing along here quite nicely as well.  But there’s areas you go to ... you never see Seals down here. You see Sea Lions.

CRAWFORD: Port Pegasus?

NORTHE: Yep. Sea Lions everywhere down here, but not Seals.

CRAWFORD: Ok. What about Seals around Codfish and the Ruggedies?

NORTHE: Yeah, once in a while. I can’t remember seeing any Seals around there. But definitely Sea Lions at times. And up here at the Islands, it just seethes with Seals.

CRAWFORD: The Titi Islands?

NORTHE: Yeah. You go out there, and the whole bloody rocks will just ... heads popping up, and Seals everywhere. It just moves.

CRAWFORD: But see, you were here back in the mid-80s ...

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: You remember what it was like back then. And you've seen changes in Seal abundance since the time you got here?

NORTHE: In my day, they started, and then they disappeared for a variety of reasons, and now they’re coming back again.

CRWFORD: When did they start to increase again?

NORTHE: As of right now, as in the last year or so.

CRAWFORD: Noticeable increases over the past couple of years?

NORTHE: Yep, yep.

CRAWFORD: That’s extremely important to know, and it is consistent with what I’ve heard from other people. The actual mechanisms of the abundance of those Seals going up, and then down, and then up again.

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: It's obviously something that’s going to have to be an important thing for us to consider. Because if it is the case that as the Seals go, the White Pointers go - if there was an important increase of Seal abundance in Paterson Inlet, this could lead to an important increase of White Pointer abundance there as well.

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: I think most reasonable people would expect that there would be an increase in the number of White Sharks that would come in to investigate and or prey on those Seals.

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Given that we know White Sharks are already in Paterson Inlet, and at levels that are quite a bit higher than most people would have expected.

NORTHE: Yep, yeah.

CRAWFORD: But I have to be careful not to put words in your mouth. Is what I just said consistent with your thinking?

NORTHE: Yep, yep. Very much. Nudge and them saw 20-odd Seals around the spit at Bravo Island the other day. That hasn’t happened for many, many, many years.

CRAWFORD: Ok. So, we’re talking about an ecosystem that is in the middle of some significant changes?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: And it is reasonable to expect that those ecosystem changes are linked to White Pointer-Human interactions. Where the Sharks are, and what they’re doing?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Have you heard of anybody else that might have thought there is some other component of the ecosystem ... some other thing that’s either attracting the White Pointers, or related to why they’re here during that season?

NORTHE: No. To my knowledge, its primarily for the Seals. It has to be, it’s a major food source.

CRAWFORD: Ok. You said before you had not seen White Pointers outside of the Inlet. Have you heard of people who have seen White Pointers out around the Titi Islands?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Did that go all the way back in the day, when you came to the Island? Up to the present? 

NORTHE: Maybe there would have been sightings pre-Shark cage diving, but the sightings have really started since the Shark cage diving - but also in conjunction with the Seals breeding.

CRAWFORD: Fair enough. Prior to the cage dive operations, but also prior to the dramatic increase in Seals around here. Back in the old days, pre-cage driving - when you heard about people seeing White pointers, were they mostly Level 1 observations, or Level 2 drive-bys, or Level 3 interest, or Level 4 attitude?

NORTHE: Probably more observations, around the 1 to 2 Level.

CRAWFORD: And another factor that affects the number of times we hear about people seeing White Pointers, is the number of people that are out there.

NORTHE: Yep, yep. 

CRAWFORD: Has there been a dramatic increase in the number of people that are out at the Titi Island?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Including vessels that come over for daytrips, maybe to get a feed of Cod - that kind of thing?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: But what I’m very interested in is, have you noticed any change in the distribution of the Levels of the encounters? Is it still, now, in recent times, mostly Level 1s and Level 2s? 

NORTHE: Yes, and also into the Level 3s. To me, a Shark’s mouth is its hands. It goes and grabs anything, and feels, and does its thing. So, if it goes up to a boat and shakes a boat, it doesn’t mean to me it's necessarily aggressive. It might be that it just needs to feel and touch. Cause it hasn’t got hands or whatever, it needs to do it with its mouth.

CRAWFORD: Fair enough. 

NORTHE: I’ve heard all these stories about outboards you know? With outboards, they’ll be going it seems they have some sort of pulse, and they follow them, or they want to grab them. And maybe its electrical - I don’t know, perhaps it is. But that to me doesn’t necessarily make me feel it's aggressive. If it's trying to knock the boat over ...

CRAWFORD: Right. And another thing is that, even if the general behaviour did not change the probability of encounter Levels - if there was an important increase in White Pointer abundance, it would necessarily increase the occurrence rates. Just by straight numbers of encounters. Do you think the relative proportion of encounter Levels has changed?

NORTHE: I think it's the same proportion, just the numbers have increased. I’ve spent a lot of time out there, and I can’t believe I haven’t seen one. I want to see one, I’m hanging out to see one. I’m there with my binoculars on pelagic trips, because this is a great place to see the Yellow-Eyed Penguins on the back of some of these Islands.

CRAWFORD: Right. Back in the day, you didn’t spend so much time on the Titi Islands? Or did you?

NORTHE: Oh, I have spent quite a lot of time out at the Islands. Pāua diving, Muttonbirding once, but also go out for Cod, or a Crayfish dive, something like that. But I’ve never seen a Shark when I’m out there. 

CRAWFORD: And for all of that time out around the Titi Islands, you never once saw a White Pointer?

NORTHE: No. And this includes diving by myself at times, and I got dropped on a bloody rock right in the middle here one time for an hour. "You go and get the Crayfish, Greg. We’ll go and get some Cod, and we’ll come back and pick you up." It's a bit dangerous, but it's one of the things we used to do. Even though in the back of your head ... Sharks.

CRAWFORD: Right. Let’s get back to Seals as food. Have you ever heard of anybody else that has seen a White Pointer attacking a Seal? Taking a Seal, or trying to take a Seal?

NORTHE: Yes I have heard of that. And also I’ve seen dead Seals - I've got photos I can show you. Can I put it like this ... one of the first Shark cage dives that were here, they used to drag round an imitation Seal.

CRAWFORD: Where, specifically?

NORTHE: Edwards Island. And they were seen by these guys who were fishing in a nearby boat - dragging this thing, and then wham! The Shark came out of the water and grabbed it. That's not a Seal, but it's ...

CRAWFORD: I get it. Have you heard of other people that have seen a White Pointer attempting to take a Seal?

NORTHE: No, no.

CRAWFORD: They’re rare events.

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Why do you think that is? Why do you think that there are so few observations of White Pointers taking Seals - if that kind of feeding is a principal reason for why they come here?

NORTHE: Because no one's observed them very much. No one's out there actually studying them - until just recently, with the Shark tagging program. And now that the Shark cage divers are there ... so, there's people all of a sudden stationed there. Obviously, the Sharks are getting attracted round.

CRAWFORD: But I'm still scratching my head - why is it so rare to see White Pointer attacks on Seals?

NORTHE: They need to be studied more. I think we can find that out. Maybe they do it at nighttime. Maybe they do it in different ways that we don’t know about.

CRAWFORD: I think maybe you have hit on something.

NORTHE: I’m willing to bet that if somebody lived out on Edwards Island, and looked every day for hours and hours and hours, you’d start picking up those sorts of events. I wouldn’t mind betting my gumboots ... generally, the water clarity up here is so good that maybe they do need dusk or twilight or what not, to make it happen more.

CRAWFORD: And water visibility is different in Paterson Inlet, than it is out at the Titi Island? Generally, and seasonally?

NORTHE: Yep, yep, yep.

CRAWFORD: With regards to Science, but in particular some of the DOC tagging research that’s taken place around Stewart Island, have you had discussions about any of that with Clinton Duffy?

NORTHE: Not with Clinton, with Kina.

CRAWFORD: Kina Scollay?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Did you ever go to any of the DOC presentations at the community hall?

NORTHE: No.

CRAWFORD: But you’ve had some interaction with people directly involved in the DOC tagging program on White Pointers?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: In a very general sense, if you had to crystallize the things that we’ve learned from them, what’s one big thing that we’ve learned?

NORTHE: About the Whites?

CRAWFORD: Yeah. There have been several things, but to your mind, what’s one of the biggest things that we’ve learned about the White Pointers here?

NORTHE: Probably behaviour patterns.

CRAWFORD: Like what?

NORTHE: Apparently their more aggressive nature, than other White Pointers around the world. That’s something I find interesting.

CRAWFORD: Ok. What do you know about the tagging research DOC did when they were here?

NORTHE: Oh, you mean naming the Sharks, and tagging them, and following them all around - wherever it went to. I think that’s quite amazing. Just the seasonal, you know ... they come, and they go.

CRAWFORD: Where do they go?

NORTHE: I can’t remember distinctly where. They go to the warmer water don’t they? They follow the warm water pattern. We didn’t know how many, the numbers there was. And they’re still getting new ones coming in, or ones they haven’t tagged yet.

4. WHITE POINTER ENCOUNTERS - DIRECT EXPERIENCES

CRAWFORD: How many times were you on the water that you saw White Pointers? 

NORTHE: I can think of two separate occasions.

CRAWFORD: Let’s talk about the first one. Roughly when was it?

NORTHE: I was still at the Salmon Farm. I was probably Assistant Manager, and I was driving the boat back up to the Farm after dropping of some casual harvesters ...

CRAWFORD: That means a shuttle from the Salmon Farm over to Golden Bay?

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: You had just made that shuttle?

NORTHE: Yeah. And I was heading back to the Farm to pick up the rest of the guys.

CRAWFORD: You were in Paterson Inlet between Golden Bay ...

NORTHE: I would take a boat from there, go through the gap, round here to Golden Bay, drop them off. And then, as I was returning, right through here, I saw the biggest Shark I’ve ever seen in my life.

CRAWFORD: That's on the southern side of Ulva Island?

NORTHE: Ulva Island. And that was way back then - it was pre-Shark cage driving.

CRAWFORD: Roughly what year would that have been? 

NORTHE: So, go backwards ... it would have been '92? Something like that? Early '90s.

CRAWFORD: And roughly what time of year?

NORTHE: If I’m dropping the casual harvesters off, it will be this time of year.

CRAWFORD: December?

NORTHE: Yeah. Harvest time.

CRAWFORD: [Discussion about project classification levels for human encounters with White Pointers: Level 1-Observation, Level 2-Swim-By, Level 3-Interest, Level 4-Intense]

CRAWFORD: When you saw this White Pointer off Ulva Island, what were the circumstances? You were in a boat that was moving. What did you see?

NORTHE: I saw its dorsal fin and the tip of its tail, swimming along. I immediately tried to get a better look at it. I was in a 12-metre boat, and I estimated that the fish was half the length of the boat.

CRAWFORD: 6 metres?

NORTHE: Yeah. Or close to that.

CRAWFORD: When you first saw it, approximately how far away do you figure it was from you?

NORTHE: From here to the hedge, just here, those plants - so what’s that?

CRAWFORD: 30 metres?

NORTHE:  Yeah, 25 or 30 metres.

CRAWFORD: Were you motoring on at a fair speed? 

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: So, you throttled back?

NORTHE: Yep. And immediately tried to drive closer to it. "Wow, it's a Shark. I’ve got to check this out." And followed it for a wee bit. I halved the distance.

CRAWFORD: So, now you were down to about 10 metres, 15 metres away?

NORTHE: Yep. And it sunk and disappeared. Never saw it again. I hung around for quite some time, hoping to see it again, or to spot its fin in the distance. It seemed to be quite determined on where it was heading.

CRAWFORD: It was headed due east on the south side of Ulva?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: And it was at the surface when you first saw it?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: For how long did you follow - that it stayed at the surface?

NORTHE: Oh, probably 30-odd seconds. Maybe a little bit longer. I saw it from a distance and drove closer to it but, parallel as well.

CRAWFORD: Describe its swimming, during the time you were watching it.

NORTHE: My distinct memories are seeing its dorsal fin and its tail. I can’t remember too much ...

CRAWFORD: Did it appear to be a casual swim?

NORTHE: Yes, it didn’t appear ... it was quite quick. Quicker than what I thought. You sort of tend to think of a Shark going through the water quite slowly. I think it was quicker than that. It may have been doing a couple of knots.

CRAWFORD: Without apparently giving her? I know it's difficult for people to evaluate, but that kind of swimming ... It gets back to the idea that they are incredibly powerful swimmers. That even with casual stride, they could be doing a few knots. 

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: All right. It's completely impossible to know with certainty, but did you get the sense that the animal was submerging because you were approaching?

NORTHE: Yep. Yeah, definitely.

CRAWFORD: Why did you get that impression?

NORTHE: Because, from first seeing it, it was happily swimming along the surface. And then as I got closer, it just ...

CRAWFORD: But were you close to a drop-off? Or something that it would have naturally caused it to submerge?

NORTHE: No, no. We were in deep water

CRAWFORD: When you first saw it - what was the depth of water, roughly?

NORTHE: Well, what is it on the chart? I can’t quite read that - 17 metres is it?

CRAWFORD: Yeah. Pretty consistent along that stretch. There’s no drop-off there.

NORTHE: No.

CRAWFORD: All right. That is very interesting. You said there was a second observation?

NORTHE: Yeah. We've got to go back earlier. And this was around the Salmon Farm, where myself and another guy were on shift.

CRAWFORD: So Big Glory?

NORTHE: Yep. And we were forever on the alert for Seal attacks.

CRAWFORD: On the nets? Or on the fish in the nets?

NORTHE: On the fish. And all of a sudden, you’d get a cage of fish just absolutely go ballistic. King Salmon, as you know is a school fish, and part of their defense mechanism is to form a ball, and the main school survives. The fish would just roar around the cage, within the confines of the cage.

CRAWFORD: You knew something was up.

NORTHE: So, something’s out there. Something’s going on. We walked out down the cage, and we could see this fin, dorsal fin, going along the thing, and a big bow wake coming off it. That's all we could see, was the dorsal fin, but you could see the wake coming off from the big, big Shark swimming around the outside of one of our cages. My mate, Stumpy, went upstairs, jumped in his wetsuit, wanted to look at it - so he leaped in the cage. But no, there was no sign of it. You sort of feel some sort of protection when you’re inside a flimsy net.

CRAWFORD: [laughs]

NORTHE: We used to do a lot of diving on the outside of the cages. More and more in block inspections, more and more in slimming nets, taking them off, hanging weights, on and off nets. You'd be down there like a tea bag.

CRAWFORD: Roughly what year was this?

NORTHE: I was doing shift work, so that would have been early 1990s.

CRAWFORD: Within a couple of years of when you saw the one off Ulva Island?

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah. And then it took years and years - we never saw another shark anywhere near the cage. Except for Spikey Dogfish, which are School Sharks. The whole of Paterson Inlet gets full of them at times. We’d never hardly ever see another Shark up there. But then in my last few years we got two Porbeagle Sharks, and lots of Sevengillers hanging around the cages.

CRAWFORD: And this would have been mid to late nineties?

NORTHE: Yep. I've got photos of them, because we caught them and killed them.

CRAWFORD: The Sevengillers?

NORTHE: Yep. And the Porbeagles.

CRAWFORD: Were they actively harassing the Salmon?

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: Even the Porbeagles?

NORTHE: There’s a lot of escapees out of a Salmon Farm at times, and because that's where they get fed, that becomes their own artificial reef. If there’s any escapes, they swim around the outside of the Farm. We used to get visited daily by the Dolphins. Every night by Seals. Sometimes during the day by Seals.

CRAWFORD: They’re not just attracted to the Salmon inside the pens - the smell, the sound, whatever. But also, you’ve got escapees outside that serve as another natural attraction or magnet for predators?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Ok. The White Pointer that you saw in Big Glory ... you said you saw the dorsal fin and a bow wake?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Ok. So, the animal was moving. But, in order for a bow wake to be noticeable, it's got to be a fair amount of, it's got to be pushing a fair volume of water.

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: That's another indication that it was a big fish.

NORTHE: I can’t tell you for sure that it was a Great White. But it was a massive big Shark with a dorsal fin. Most probably it was.

CRAWFORD: Bigger than the other fish, the other Shark that you saw off Ulva Island?

NORTHE: No, I think the one I saw over there was the biggest thing I’ve ever seen in my life, apart from Basking Sharks.

CRAWFORD: At the Salmon Farm, how big was the dorsal fin out of the water?

NORTHE: We were looking at it from behind, so it was hard to say. But it was sticking up out of the water like this.

CRAWFORD: Half a metre, maybe?

NORTHE: And the wake you could see because it was that calm. And as it got further up around the cages, the fish had just got all ripply and wavy from all the fish action.

CRAWFORD: There was no interaction that you saw after that?

NORTHE: No, no.

CRAWFORD: The fin just disappeared, and that was it?

NORTHE: Yep, yep.

CRAWFORD: No interaction with the nets?

NORTHE: As I say, my mate went and down to dive in that cage of fish, just to see if it was still hanging round. But no sightings.

CRAWFORD: Very useful, very good information, very good insight.

5. WHITE POINTER ENCOUNTERS - EXPERIENCES OF OTHERS

NORTHE: Thule Wharf, which is ... so there’s Golden Bay. Thule Wharf is right here, right in there. Some guys set a little bait net, just off the point here. And a Great White swum into it, got tangled up, and drowned.

CRAWFORD: When was this?

NORTHE: This is ... I’ve got photos of that as well. I was Manager, it was just before I left. So, it must have been ’96. It wasn’t a big one - maybe 10 or 11 foot.

CRAWFORD: I’ve heard this story, but you've got photographs?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: And it was somebody that was just setting net for some bait fish there?

NORTHE: Yeah, for Greenbone. And that made everybody go "Whoooah". 

CRAWFORD: Because they didn’t know White Pointers were inside Paterson Inlet?

NORTHE: That's right there. That's right where everybody, you know ... there’s a wharf, there are boats, there are frickin' people swimming, 

CRAWFORD: Swimming right there?

NORTHE: Yeah. And it just blew us away, collectively, as a community.

CRAWFORD: This was when?

NORTHE: I’m thinking that was probably ’96 or '97.

CRAWFORD: Almost ten years ago,

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Time of year for the setnet?

NORTHE: Hmmm.

CRAWFORD: Was it an Islander's setnet?

NORTHE: No.

CRAWFORD: A cribbie?

NORTHE: Yeah, some cribbies on it.

CRAWFORD: So, maybe it was summertime?

NORTHE: I’d have to think it was, yeah. If I took it with my digital camera, there’d have to be a date on it.

CRAWFORD: Yes, it would. If it was a digital shot.

NORTHE: I think so, I can’t quite remember now.

CRAWFORD: Ok. So, technically you've seen three White Pointers in Paterson Inlet, one of them was caught and dead - that was the third, the most recent?

NORTHE: Yeah. That’s within the Inlet, we’re talking about. I’m not talking about the ones on the outside.

CRAWFORD: Fair enough. And I think for obvious reasons, we’re going to go through the same kind of discussion for White Pointers outside of Paterson Inlet. But before we leave the Inlet I want to go back to when you were a young guy. What, if anything, did the old-timers say about White Pointers in the Inlet? Did anybody every take you aside, and say "You know, there’s White Pointers swimming here"?

NORTHE: No, no. I had never heard of any stories of White Pointers in the Inlet. More recently yes, but not back in my time when I was at the Salmon Farm.

CRAWFORD: All right, let's move to more recent times. Have you seen or heard of White Pointers in Paterson Inlet?

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: Have you seen them recently?

NORTHE: No.

CRAWFORD: Have you heard of White Pointers in Paterson Inlet in recent years?

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: Roughly, how many different instances have you heard of?

NORTHE: Just in the last few years, it’s been a huge spike in sightings in Paterson inlet.

CRAWFORD: What are we talking, like ten sightings?

NORTHE: Yeah, probably.

CRAWFORD: Which would be like roughly one sighting per year?

NORTHE: Some hunters were one of them who really made me sit up and take notice. They saw one up here in Little Glory Bay, there's a hunting hut, just in here. They were up in their little tinny, catching Cod just off round the point here, when they were circled by a White Pointer there.

CRAWFORD: When was this?

NORTHE: Two years ago.

CRAWFORD: Time of year? Roughly?

NORTHE: Hunting time. So, it would have probably been February, March.

CRAWFORD: Circling. So, this was a Level 3 encounter? 

NORTHE: Yep. Level 3.

CRAWFORD: Not just an observation, not just a drive-by. Some degree of interest?

NORTHE: Yep. Well, they were fishing too. So, probably safe to assume that a Shark would have more interest.

CRAWFORD: It's all in context, yes. It’s just a matter of making sure that we get the right kind of encounter description. There was no attitude or edge from the animal - that you heard of?

NORTHE: No, no.

CRAWFORD: Ok, that was one. What's another observation you've heard of in the Inlet?

NORTHE: My friend [Nudge?? Craig Farmer??], they work up in Big Glory Bay on the Mussels and Oysters up around in here. They leave from Thule Wharf ... 

CRAWFORD: That’s where the setnet you described had been set?

NORTHE: Yep, yep, yep. They leave from there every day, and travel up here to the Farm. They left their moorings ... this is last year ...very, very fine morning, calm as. And a White Pointer started following their boat, virtually till they got round the tip of Ulva. Followed them all the way from the moorings to here.

CRAWFORD: What time of year?

NORTHE: Ah, I don’t know. We’d have to ask him.

CRAWFORD: And, that White Pointer was following their boat. What kind of boat was it?

NORTHE: It's a steel, probably about a 6-7 metre.

CRAWFORD: Is this the 'Little Stinky' that I've heard about?

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah. 'Stinky'. You’ve got this story?

CRAWFORD: Well, I think Phillip related this back to some other stuff.

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah. Ok.

CRAWFORD: What kind of motor might it have on it?

NORTHE: Oh, it doesn’t go very fast. I think it goes to about 6 or 7 knots. It would be a Ford 4-cylinder; probably something like that. It's not made for speed.

CRAWFORD: An inboard?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Not an outboard motor?

NORTHE: Inboard.

CRAWFORD: Ok. And it followed them. What’s that distance between the wharf and Ulva? Is that a kilometre?

NORTHE: Oh, at least. A kilometre and a half. 

CRAWFORD: And the White Pointer followed them all the way over to Ulva?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Was it doing anything other than following?

NORTHE: No.

CRAWFORD: Following at the surface?

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah. In their wake.

CRAWFORD: And they would have been putzing along?

NORTHE: I’ve been on that boat quite a lot of times. I wouldn’t think they’d be doing more than 7 knots. Be less than 7 probably.

CRAWFORD: Do you think that they probably sped up when they saw the White Pointer following them?

NORTHE: No, no. I think they would have tried to slow down to get a better look at it.

CRAWFORD: Did the animal show anything other than following behaviour?

NORTHE: Not that I’m aware of.

CRAWFORD: And then once they got to Ulva Island - what happened?

NORTHE: It just disappeared, as far as the story goes. But he would be able to elaborate a lot more on that. And there was two or three guys on the boat who witnessed the same thing. So it’s not just one person saying so,

CRAWFORD: Right. What's another example that you‘ve heard of, over the past, say, ten years? Of White Pointers in Paterson Inlet?

NORTHE: A guy called [Kevin Schofield??], he sometimes comes over to the Island, and moors his fishing boat in Deep Bay here. Nice, deep little patch. Put moorings in there.

CRAWFORD: Just up from Golden Bay?

NORTHE: Yep, yep. He was coming in, and a Shark followed him.

CRAWFORD: Coming in from outside?

NORTHE: From outside. So, he would have come through here, around Native Island, into Deep Bay, and a Great White was swimming around inside. Circling his boat, so, Level 3 again.

CRAWFORD: When did he first see the White Pointer? In Deep Bay? 

NORTHE: Well, no. Apparently, it followed him in there. So, he must have seen it sometime before Deep Bay.

CRAWFORD: Ok. Kevin is on my list of people to contact. But once the White Pointer was in Deep Harbour, then it circled his boat - according to your understanding?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Level 3? Or any attitude?

NORTHE: No attitude. But definitely circling the boat with some sort of interest, looking. And it was maybe suggested by other people, and I don’t know if this is true or not, that he may have the same engine in his boat as one of the Shark cage operators that dive out at Edwards Island. And whether people are surmising, but that it may have followed the boat because of that.

CRAWFORD: That there could have been an association of engine sound? Or whatever else the motor is putting out?

NORTHE: Could have been. Usually, the Shark cage boat moors up here with the rest of the fleet. But in strong easterlies, they come round here and use Golden Bay, that hill with shelter. Because when you get a big southern easterly, its bloody horrible. So, the Shark cage boat quite often moors out here.

CRAWFORD: You mean Golden Bay?

NORTHE: Where a couple of these sightings have been.

CRAWFORD: Ok. That’s something that has come up in some of the interviews as well. The idea being that there may be some degree of association with the Shark cage boat itself. But has anybody seen White Pointers actually in association with the Shark cage boat, when it's inside Paterson Inlet at Golden Bay?

NORTHE: Not that I know of. And I don’t think for a minute think the Shark cage guy would go "Hey, whatever. There’s a big White Pointer following my boat in."

CRAWFORD: Right. But that's why your previous experience is so important. The White Pointers were obviously in Paterson Inlet before the Shark cage dive operations. The White Pointer that you saw off Ulva Island was at least five years before any cage diving even started.

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah.

CRAWFORD: All right. Let’s focus on the Bays. Have you, in all of your time around Stewart island, have you ever seen any White Pointers in Halfmoon Bay or Horseshoe Bay?

NORTHE: I’ve seen two dead ones in Horseshoe Bay that were caught from a local fisherman’s net. They targeted the Sharks cause they were seen at summertime while people were in the water.

CRAWFORD: These were Joe Cave’s nets?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: When was this?

NORTHE: 1990s, must have been. Not too sure on that.

CRAWFORD: Do you know anybody who has seen Live White Pointers in either of the Bays?

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: Other than the animals that were caught in Joe Cave's Shark nets?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Ok. What other people’s accounts have you heard?

NORTHE: Yo Yo and Jesse were, friends of ours that used to live here, they’re not here anymore - they took their little tinny out to Ackers Point, just out here on the lighthouse, with their children, young kiddies. Catching a couple of Cod, beautiful day.

CRAWFORD: Just linefishing?

NORTHE: Yep. Big White Pointer comes up, starts circling the boat, Mom freaks out, holding the babies. "Get the fuck out a here, Yo Yo!" Vroooom.

CRAWFORD: When was this?

NORTHE: Three, four years ago.

CRAWFORD: Time of year?

NORTHE: I imagine it was summertime. Yeah, it would be summer.

CRAWFORD: With circling. That means it’s a Level 3. 

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Not a level 4? No attitude?

NORTHE: No.

CRAWFORD: I mean, the fear could be intense. But was there any additional kind of interest or interaction on the part of the animal?

NORTHE: Don’t think so. It was more just the fear that made them take off. That's instinctive.

CRAWFORD: Sure. But there was no bumping of the boat or anything?

NORTHE: No, no. I don’t think there was.

CRAWFORD: Ok.

NORTHE: Another incident - there was a paddle boarder, apparently paddling across here ...

CRAWFORD: Across where?

NORTHE: Across Half-Moon Bay from here ...

CRAWFORD: From the southern Bathing Beach over to the northern Bathing Beach, roughly?

CRAWFORD: Yeah. And seeing a big Shark and crap himself. Standing on a paddle board, you’d be ...

CRAWFORD: That’s just outside of the moorings in the harbour?

NORTHE: That’s just here, yeah.

CRAWFORD: When was this?

NORTHE: Once again, this would be two or three years back. Because people have stopped doing these things now, you know? They’re not doing those kind of activities, because of the fear of Sharks. And they’re starting to turn up.

CRAWFORD: When was there a decline in kind of, kiteboarding or standup paddle boarding - that type of thing?

NORTHE: Oh, I think it’s only in the last two or three years that it's declined. Because of just word of mouth. It gets out there. If you have a look on the side of the shop down there, you’ve got the Four Square Man wearing traditionally summer shorts, and nice bright clothes, holding a surf board? One of my things that I want to do - and I might do it - "No surfing here, Bro. Too many White Pointers!" I want to go down, and put a little comment on it. 

CRAWFORD: I don’t remember seeing the surf board, but thank you for bringing that up.

NORTHE: Oh, you will.

CRAWFORD: Ok. Last question for this section. Are you aware of any Level 4 interactions between White Pointers and Humans, anywhere along the South Island coastline, through the Foveaux Strait, or around Stewart Island? Are you aware of any Level 4 high intensity or attack situations?

NORTHE: I’ve heard of one Shark attack to a surfer, but I don’t know if that was a Great White or not.

CRAWFORD: What did you hear? First, where?

NORTHE: Is it ... they call it Porridge?

CRAWFORD: Yes.

NORTHE: I’m not entirely sure - over here?

CRAWFORD: Yes. That's Garden, that's Porridge.

NORTHE: So, somewhere over here.

CRAWFORD: What had you heard - more than just that something had happened?

NORTHE: That a Shark had grabbed somebody - a surfer - by his leg, and come to realize what it was.

CRAWFORD: Ok. Any other Level 4s that you know of in the Strait, or around Stewart island immediately?

NORTHE: No.

6. EFFECTS OF CAGE TOUR DIVE OPERATIONS

CRAWFORD: To your knowledge, when did Shark cage dive operations start around here? When is the first time you remember hearing about them?

NORTHE: On a commercial level?

CRAWFORD: Well, you’ve just said something a little different. Have you heard about any non-commercial Shark cage diving?

NORTHE: I’ve heard of people bringing a cage over for diving. I don’t know if it was commercially, but I mean the last five years was the commercial cage operations.

CRAWFORD: Ok, we’ll focus on that. When they started their commercial operations, where? What locations?

NORTHE: Always out in front of Titi Islands. 

CRAWFORD: Edwards Island in particular?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Have you ever been on a cage diving boat operation?

NORTHE: No.

CRAWFORD: Have you seen an operation while it's running?

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: Between what you’ve seen and what you have heard, tell me your understanding of the process of cage diving, and then we’ll talk about the potential effects. So, a boat with some punters and a cage comes over to Edwards Island. What’s the next thing that happens? Once they arrive, what do they do?

NORTHE: Well, they all jump on the boat, they go out, they anchor off Edwards, and, as far as I’m aware, they put some sort of berley in the water. Previous to this year, they used to use Tuna. I can remember them chopping up Tuna down at the garage down here. Gallons and gallons and gallons of it. So, as soon as they get a sighting, then they’ve got people already kitted it up, just ready to go. They lower the cage, jump in ...

CRAWFORD: They take their pictures.

NORTHE: They get their jollies.

CRAWFORD: They do that for the day, maybe in and out of the cage several times.

NORTHE: Seven or eight hundred bucks per person. Crike, mate - what a great thing.

CRAWFORD: Do you know when their season, when their operations start? And how long they go till? Roughly?

NORTHE: They come in December, and from memory, the last time I can remember them being here, was probably April. They seem to be gone ... I normally do a month’s holiday around April, when I get away hunting. And they’re usually gone by the time I come back. 

CRAWFORD: Ok. The only thing I think I would add to that description, just for clarity - is that there’s a distinction between the berley, which is a mince, and a fish head or fish body part tied on a line as a tow bait to guide the White Pointers in alongside the boat, closer to the cage.

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: And the other important thing here is the permit. Prior to last year, there was no permit - none was required. There was no restriction on where to go, or what to do or not do. We’re in the middle of a two-year permit right now, so we’re going to focus mostly on the permit conditions, which says that the berley mince has to be of a particularly small size. So, it's not really a food, it's a more a smell of food. 

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: And that the tow bait ... there are controls in the permit about doing everything they can to make sure that the White Pointers don’t actually get the bait. There's a limit to the number they can use.

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: So, if that’s kind of the common understanding of what the cage dive operations are - what I want to do now, is take you through a series of questions about potential effects. I’m going to try and build from simple to more complex. 

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: First, do you think that for cage dive operations, the White Pointers would be affected in their behaviour, to associate the place, Edwards Island specifically in this case, with the smell of food that they get from the cage dive operations? Do you think that there are more White Pointers that tend to hang around Edwards Island, than would normally be there, because of the cage dive operations?

NORTHE: Yes. I do believe that Shark cage diving would unnaturally attract them to that particular point. 

CRAWFORD: Do you think that a number of White Pointers would have been there at Edwards anyways? And that the cage diving operations might increase the number that are around Edwards Island?

NORTHE: Yes, I do believe that the Sharks were there anyways, and have been breeding up exponentially over the years - since they were protected. By having a centralized place, where it may force them to congregate more in that particular area, I believe that.

CRAWFORD: So, association between cage dive operations and the place, as the simplest possible effect?

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: Let’s add now the next thing. Do you think that the White Pointers that are coming into proximity with the cage diving operations - do they associate the operations with boats in general? If somebody went over to Edwards at some time when the Shark cage operation was not working, would the Sharks be responding to the presence of any boat there, regardless of the nature of the boat? More than they would have, without the cage dive operations?

NORTHE: No. I don’t think so. Because once again I can only draw on my experiences ... we’ve been out there - a hundred metres away from the Shark cage boat and our boat, and we don’t see any Sharks. We don’t go right beside them, but we know one operator who does and ...

CRAWFORD: Ok. Let's put a placeholder on that issue - we’ll get back to that. But, you have been within a couple hundred metres when the cage dive operations have been running?

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: And the Sharks around their operation did not come around to your boat?

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: That, I think, might be the first time that somebody’s talked about that. I’ve got other people who have shared stories where they’ve gone out in a similar kind of way, not even as close as one or two hundred meters, and they have seen Sharks at their boat. So, that's an important observation.

NORTHE: Hmm.

CRAWFORD: In general though, if somebody just took any old boat out there at any other time, you don’t think that the cage dive operations would have necessarily increased the number of encounters at one Level or another with the boats? More so, than if the cage dive operations had not happened?

NORTHE: Well, I think since the Shark cage diving operations started, you’ve got a great chance of seeing more White Pointers around that area - because of the Shark cage diving operations. 

CRAWFORD: But now I'm talking specifically about a boat in a location they come across.

NORTHE: And any boat, yeah.

CRAWFORD: Do you think that the behaviour of the White Pointers has changed in that way? That the Sharks are associating with boats more now? That they will go to boats more - because of the cage dive operations?

NORTHE: Yes, probably.

CRAWFORD: Ok. Let’s talk now about specific boats. I’ve heard some people say yes - and some people say no. That the White Pointers are capable of actually discriminating Peter Scott’s boat and Mike Haines' boat from other boats. And that, if the White Pointers saw or heard or however else they sense, those specific cage diving boats in some other place where it wasn’t berleying - that they would be attracted just to that boat. Do you think that that would happen?

NORTHE: Yes, I do.

CRAWFORD: Why do you think that?

NORTHE: Oh, I think it’s trained behaviour.

CRAWFORD: And you think it’s within the capabilities of a White Pointer to make that type of learning?

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: At that specific a level - of an individual boat?

NORTHE: Yep, definitely. 

CRAWFORD: What reasons might you have for that thinking?

NORTHE: I think it’s more to do with the food supply that comes from those particular boats, or the titillation of the food smells that might be coming out of that boat. I know how easy it is to train a wild animal to feed out of your hand. We used to feed Dolphins, Yellow-Eyed Penguins and Barracoutas by hand.

CRAWFORD: Barracoutas? Another fish species?

NORTHE: Yeah. 

NORTHE: Yeah. When we have all the little wee fish, and we’re grading them to a size: large, mediums, smalls, any runts go into a big bin. The Dolphins know straight away when that pump gets started up. They’re there, and they’re waiting for those fish. And then we started feeding, and then the Yellow-Eyes come around, and then the Barracoutas.

CRAWFORD: Ok. That’s an important observation. Because some people talk about "Well, yes, ok. I can see it from a mammal. And some people say "Yes, I could even see it from a bird." That there is some type of learned association. But then some people say that a fish is different - that a fish wouldn’t be able to do that type of association. 

NORTHE: Of course they do. [laughs]

CRAWFORD: Ok. So, that's an important observation of yours. But getting back to associating specific boats - some people have talked about the visual cues of the boat, some people have talked even about the colour of the anti-fouling paint on a boat, some people have talked about distinctive sounds of a particular boat, or even electromagnetic signature of a specific motor.

NORTHE: Yes, yep.

CRAWFORD: Do you think that those things together, provide enough in combination with a White Pointer’s capability, that it could know that that boat is a Shark cage dive boat? And reckon "I have experienced that boat, and with the smell of food before"?

NORTHE: I believe that. I firmly believe that.

CRAWFORD: Ok. Once the dive cage has been lowered, and there are people in the water. Humans in wet suits, in the water, inside the cage. Do you think the White Pointers associate the smell of the food, with the occurrence of people in the water - such that, if they were some other place at some other time, that they would see a Human in the water and respond to it differently - because of their exposure to the cage dive operation?

NORTHE: Yeah. I believe they would do that.

CRAWFORD: Why do you think that?

NORTHE: Once again, it's just free food association. They’re natural. If you teach anything to come up to you with food - a wild animal, bird, fish, mammal - you’re teaching it. You’re teaching it to associate people with food, motor noises, whatever. If they took the Shark cage diving way the hell over here ...

CRAWFORD: So, the other side of the Foveaux Straight

NORTHE: I wouldn’t give a crap. [laughs] I wouldn’t care about it. But since they’re doing it on our doorstep, that what bugs me. It bugs me that they’re doing it, associating it with that food, with people, right on our doorsteps.

CRAWFORD: You made a very good point - that if the cage dive operations happened at some other location, you would be less concerned, than you would be if the cage diving is happening within say 3 or 4 kilometres from Halfmoon, Horseshoe, Paterson Inlet.

NORTHE: Yep, yep.

CRAWFORD: I'm presuming that concern has to do with the swimming capabilities or the swimming behaviour of the White Pointers.

NORTHE: Yeah.

 CRAWFORD: Even with the Science information from the tagging program, do you think that a White Pointer over here at Riverton, or off Escape Reef in the Strait - do you think that White Pointers over there, are also likely to be travelling along the Northeastern shore of Stewart Island and potentially going into the Bays, or Paterson Inlet?

NORTHE: Yes. If they’re following their food source. Which is Seals.

CRAWFORD: Ok. Let’s imagine the cave dive operations were at the southern tip of Stewart Island.

NORTHE: Ok.

CRAWFORD: Do you think that affect the Shark’s response to a Human they might later encounter in Paterson Inlet?

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: If I’m getting you right, the White Pointers take that association - between the smell of food and Humans - with them, where ever they go afterwards?

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah.

CRAWFORD: And if that happened a week ago, do you think that a week later, a White Pointer that had been exposed to that situation and it had associated the smell of fish food with the occurrence of a Human, do you think that the association would last a week, or a month or what?

NORTHE: I think it would last its life. They keep having that experience to reinforce ...

CRAWFORD: Well, that's an extremely important factor. That the reinforcement if the experience happened over and over again. That's a very good question - if it was a one-off encounter with a cage dive operation, versus some number of repeated exposures. Different intensities of learning, of association.

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: If it was a one-off experience - do you think that the association in a White Pointer's mind, between the smell of food and the presence of a Human, would that be enough to actually change its behaviour at some other time and location?

NORTHE: I would think the chances are much lesser. But maybe that is all it takes. I don’t know. But certainly when they’re doing cage diving four days a week, or three days out of seven, or whatever they’re bloody doing - it's got to be, in my eyes. I’ve also got questions, like what happens when a Shark gets old - like a Lion when it gets too old, and they can’t get their food normally? Do they switch prey? To get an easy feed of something or other? We know Tigers and Lions do.

CRAWFORD: That they will go after easier prey, that might be, typically, less preferred. But as they get older, if they get sick or something - you know "beggars can’t be choosers". You take what you can. And if there is easy prey then ...

NORTHE: Let's say it happens to be someone in a scuba suit. Or a kid down at the wharf.

CRAWFORD: A Human that a White Pointer otherwise wouldn’t necessarily show interest in?

NORTHE: No. I don’t think so.

CRAWFORD: To be fair, Human beings, when we’re in the water - we are in the Shark’s domain.

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: And that kind of shift in natural tendency for a Shark to switch to less preferred prey when it is old and weak, or sick - that would happen, no matter whether there was cage diving or not.

NORTHE: Hmm.

CRAWFORD: But you, you think that the exposure to a cage diving operation ...

NORTHE: Predispose them more to ...

CRAWFORD: Would increase the probability, of a given White Pointer to investigate a Human, if it needed to?

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah.

CRAWFORD: Ok. Given that the nature of the animal’s movement becomes an important part of this discussion ... what do you know, if anything, about the number of individual animals that are repeat customers at the cage dive operations? Do you know anything about that? Versus, one-time through, and they never see them again?

NORTHE: I understand they see some are the same Sharks over and over again.

CRAWFORD: How have you come to know that?

NORTHE: They can recognize it through dorsal fins, bite marks, scars, any number of things. General size, sex.

CRAWFORD: I guess there are maybe two follow up questions on that. If cage tour dive operation was happening elsewhere - and that elsewhere was still within the range of individuals during the same season, then does it really matter if the cage dive operations are on the other side of Foveaux Strait? Or on the southern end of Stewart Island? if it’s still all within the individual White Pointer's movement range, the daily or weekly range of these fish? Some people have said that it’s only a matter of distance - but included in there is the assumption that the animals are separated by distance, that they don't move around that much. But let’s say that everything on this Stewart Island chart is fully within an individual White Pointer's capability to move over the course of days or weeks within the season.

NORTHE: By far, the biggest preponderance of sightings is around the Titi Islands, and that is also reinforced by the tagging program that went on. And more latterly with the Shark cage diving. I wouldn’t mind betting the Shark cage divers have come in on the heels of the tagging program - somebody’s recognized a niche, probably hasn’t tried anywhere else, but generally this is where the bigger Seal populations are, in this whole area probably. So even if they headed over here, we’re still going to get quite a lot of Sharks over here. But it doesn’t mean to say that they all associate people so much to here, or maybe more over there. I don’t know.

CRAWFORD: So, do you think that even, even then, with all of those other factors combined - do you think the cage dive operations are still having an important combined effect? In that more general context?

NORTHE: Yes. Yes I do. The food association with people. Not food association because the Seals are there, but food association because people are there, seeing them in the water, doing their thing, chumming them up, berley chunks, whatever. We know one of those shark cage operators has been busted for doing the wrong things repeatedly.

CRAWFORD: When you say "the wrong things", what do you mean?

NORTHE: Against the permit conditions.

CRAWFORD: But what kinds of infractions?

NORTHE: Feeding whole fish. Feeding more fish than what they’re supposed to. Anything and everything they can do to get a sighting for those people that have paid that much money.

CRAWFORD: Ok. Let’s focus on one of those things - and this has been the subject of much concern, but also much controversy. Prior to DOC actually requiring a permit, there was nothing preventing anybody from doing anything really. 

NORTHE: Except killing them.

CRAWFORD: Right, because of the legal protection assigned to White Pointers. But in terms of their business model, there could have been actual feeding of the White Pointers. Not just berley - but actual giving of fish as food, in order to change their behaviour, or to bring them in even closer, or whatever. Before the permits, there was no legal prohibition against that. But in general, their business model was - it still costs money for Tuna, it costs money for berley, and it costs money for these different things. And what the punters are there for, is seeing the White Pointers. Not necessarily seeing the White Pointers riled into a Level 4 state.

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

CRAWFORD: Let's imagine a cage tour dive operation where there is berley only - versus a cage tour dive operation where there is actual food going in the water, and the White Pointers are getting their teeth on something substantial, and it becomes an actual feeding environment.

NORTHE: Ok. And let's also imagine there is a cave dive operation with no food, no berley, no attractant except there is a cage in the water in a known Great White swimming area.

CRAWFORD: Yes. That is exactly what I'm trying to get to.

NORTHE: Who's going see the most Sharks?

CRAWFORD: Berley beats the cage. Feeding beats the berley.

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah.

CRAWFORD: As a matter of fact, the DOC scientists who do their tagging, they can’t just go out there and magically summon White Pointers in close to their boat so they can tag them. 

CRAWFORD: They have to berley as well - at least. On some occasions they were also putting actual food over the side for the White Pointers to feed on.

NORTHE: Yes, exactly.

CRAWFORD: Obviously, it's not the type of thing that DOC is going to advertise, but it has to happen that they use attractants. Because it is a rarity to see a White Pointer in the wild, unless there is something that attracts them. 

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Let's get back to the food. We’ve already had lengthy discussions about the cod frames, especially at the fish cleaning stations like Deadman's Beach.

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Do you think that the nature of the association changes - when it's not just the smell of food, but actually the presence of food, of something going in their mouth and gut - that would somehow affect the intensity of the association Humans?

NORTHE: Yes, it would. The excitement levels would rise; they’re anticipating, knowing that they’re probably going to get what they are after.

CRAWFORD: Ok

NORTHE: And I’ve seen ... I can’t speak specifically for Sharks, but I’ve seen many, many other animals show raised excitement levels though, when their food is seen.

CRAWFORD: Not just the smell of food, but the actual presence of food?

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah.

CRAWFORD: Some people have focused on that; they've said that they still think the cage dive operations are in fact, feeding the White Pointers - contrary to the permit conditions. Whether there are 'secret shoppers' on the boats, or cameras or whatever.

NORTHE: Yeah, yeah.

CRAWFORD: The permit actually, at least, is quite clear - "Thou shall not feed".

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Let’s say that, you and I jump on your boat, and we go out to the Titi Islands. We’re not running a cage tour dive operation, we just go over there. But let’s say that you and I stop in at the fish shed before we head out, and we get a bunch of Cod frames, and take them over to Edwards. If we throw those Cod frames in the water, will that attract the White Pointers?

NORTHE: I believe it would.

CRAWFORD: And do you think that the presence of that food would push them up the encounter Levels. From a Level 2 to a Level 3, potentially up to a Level 4?

NORTHE: It would definitely increase their Level. but I wouldn’t say it would make them aggressive. It would increase their excitement levels. We might see that as aggressiveness.

CRAWFORD: Fair enough. Rather than 'aggression' to Humans, it could simply be Level 4 predation intensity, or it could be frustration if they didn't get what they wanted?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: But it’s still the attitude - the edge.

NORTHE: Yes.

CRAWFORD: There is nothing preventing non-cage tour dive operators from going out there and doing just that - feeding the White Pointers.

NORTHE: Yep.

CRAWFORD: Are you aware of people from Bluff or the Island - non-cage dive operators - who go over to the Titi Islands specifically to see White Pointers like that?

NORTHE: [laughs] Yes.

CRAWFORD: Has that always been the case?

NORTHE: I can’t speak so much from Bluff, but I can speak from the Island where somebody has just started picking up on it in the last year or two.

CRAWFORD: Ok. But let’s go back in the day ... because you were here from the mid-80s on.

NORTHE: Yep. No one ever came here to see the Sharks.

CRAWFORD: But back in the day, did local people here on Stewart Island or their guests, did they ever go out and feed the White Pointers for ecotourism?

NORTHE: No, no.

CRAWFORD: So, it’s a recent thing?

NORTHE: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Do you think its post-cage-tour dive operations that it's even on people’s radars?

NORTHE: Post DOC tagging, as well as post cage.

CRAWFORD: Right. People are now more aware generally.

NORTHE: Yep. Word of mouth. To be fair, who the hell wouldn’t want to see a Great White? It's a fantastic experience, it's amazing, it's awesome. I know I might even jump in a cage just to get my jollies as well. But I'll be damned if I’m going to do it right there, on the doorstep.

CRAWFORD: Right. And we’ve talked about the doorstep and proximity. What I’m trying to get to is the possibility of, or the desirability, from some people to go out there and feed the White Pointers just for their own ecotour moment. Without any cage around at all. Is that potentially also having an effect on the White Pointers here? Do you think that could be having an important, lasting effect?

NORTHE: I can see other businesses starting up hard on the heels of Shark cage diving, with the chance of seeing a Great White and catching a Cod while you’re out there, and charging people for it. I can see that side of it.

CRAWFORD: Yes, and potentially an increase in that type of activity.

NORTHE: Yep. And it's already happening. You know, I’ve seen fights in the pub over it. People get very hot under the collar about it.

CRAWFORD: And I’m not here to put gasoline on that fire.

NORTHE: No.

CRAWFORD: What I’m trying to do is figure out what is happening to the White Pointers, and how they are responding. If people were going out there and actually feeding the White Sharks in order to see them - for personal or ecotourism reasons - do you think that activity, could have an important and lasting effect on the behaviour of the White Pointers? An effect that could translate into increased interaction with Humans?

NORTHE: Yes. Yes I do.

CRAWFORD: So that’s something that would need to become part of the discussion as well - along with fish cleaning stations, along with fish shed processing waste, along with disposal of Fish Farm morts, along with the cage dive operations.

NORTHE: Yes. Yeah.

CRAWFORD: It's all about figuring out what the risks are, and how to manage those risks. That's all I've got for you, Greg. Thanks very much for sharing your knowledge and thinking.

NORTHE: Right.

Copyright © 2021 Greg Northe and Steve Crawford