Vaughn Fisher

1. EXPERIENCE IN AOTEAROA/NZ COASTAL ENVIRONMENTS

CRAWFORD: Vaughn, where were you born?

FISHER: Here in Bluff. 1955. 

CRAWFORD: What was your first recollection of spending significant amount of time around the water? How old were you?

FISHER: Three-ish.

CRAWFORD: Where would that have been? 

FISHER: Muttonbird Islands. Me father built a house down the Muttonbird Islands here.

CRAWFORD: The Southern Titi Islands? 

FISHER: Yes. Right in there. 

CRAWFORD: So [Putauhina Island??] 

FISHER: No, no. That's [Putauhina??] there. This is [Taukihepa??] 

CRAWFORD: Ok. What's the season for Muttonbirding?

FISHER: Harvesting commences on the first of April, and finishes at the end of May. 

CRAWFORD: So, about eight weeks. The whole family goes down? 

FISHER: Well, most of them did in them days. A lot of people prefer their kids to go to school these days, you know? Not all of them go. Some families take them, and some don’t.

CRAWFORD: Was that something that you did like a family tradition - every year?

FISHER: Wasn’t many years I didn’t. And I can’t remember what years they were. We went overseas one year, as a grown up. 

CRAWFORD: But that vast majority of years - if you were here, you'd go Muttonbirding?

FISHER: Yes. 

CRAWFORD: Ok. Did you grow up here in Bluff?

FISHER: Oh, yes. Definitely. 

CRAWFORD: Where abouts did you live? 

FISHER: Not far from here - was Walker Street. Where Colin Topi lives at the moment, we used to live there. Did you go to his place?

CRAWFORD: No. I interviewed him on his boat in Halfmoon Bay.

FISHER: Oh, ok. Right.

CRAWFORD: So, that means you grew up a stone's throw away from the coast?

FISHER: Yes. We were always down around at the beach. 

CRAWFORD: That’s what I’m trying to get to. As a kid, with older kids or adults around - where would you have been spending time on the water? In and around Bluff Harbour?

FISHER: Yes, absolutely. If it was fine, and the weather was warm. The kids were always down the rocks foraging for Pāua and stuff like that. Or just swimming, or sunbathing on the beach, or playing in the park adjacent to the beach - [Jaigo Park??]. Used to be a great recreational area. That was in the 60s. There was a lot more kids around, them days. Because of the baby boomers thing. Bluff was actually full of kids. 

CRAWFORD: Right. And that would have been there case - during the school year after school was out, on the weekends, holidays?

FISHER: Yeah. 

CRAWFORD: Did you go anywhere else for holidays?

FISHER: Our holidays ... funnily enough, we used to go up the [Paterson] Inlet at Stewart Island. 

CRAWFORD: Was that something that your family did on a regular basis?

FISHER: Yes. 

CRAWFORD: Did your family have a place there that you stayed at? 

FISHER: No, we lived on me Father’s fishing boat. 

CRAWFORD: Was that something you did during the school holidays?

FISHER: It was Christmas holidays. And there used to be a lot of boats from Bluff going there - fishing boats, with their families. Miller’s Beach and up in the Inlet there. Like New Year’s Eve, it was nothing to see 12 or 14 boats lashed up. 

CRAWFORD: Typically, how long would those trips have been? A week or two?

FISHER: Yeah. Roundabout a week to ten days.

CRAWFORD: And that was pretty much every year, around Christmastime?

FISHER: Yeah, yeah. 

CRAWFORD: When you were here, in the Bluff, were you mostly in the Harbour? Or were there places on the outside where you would visit and spend time around the water?

FISHER: Yes, but not a lot. We used to walk around the tracks when we were kids. Just beachcombing the back of the hill, and get a feed of Pāua.

CRAWFORD: So, if you were on or near the water - it was mostly down by the park in the Harbour?

FISHER: It was mostly down ... From Argyle to Stirling Point, but most of the people were from Argyle Beach to Morrison’s Beach.

CRAWFORD: And that would be hanging around, swimming, Pāua diving?

FISHER: We used to get them below water. A lot of us were too young to even snorkel. Quite often we’d be down there unattended. We just were free range. 

CRAWFORD: Ok. In terms of a boat - did you have a dinghy down there?

FISHER: Oh, we used to nick the odd dinghy. Go for a [blatt??]. Or we’d get a couple of 44-gallon drums, and lash a pallet on them, and drift around a bit. 

CRAWFORD: During Muttonbirding season, you were mostly on the Island. Did you setnet for fish as well, or anything like that?

FISHER: Not really, no. It was mainly just Pāua and a few Kinas, yeah. We wouldn’t be diving. You didn’t have to dive - just wait for the low water, go down. We didn’t swim a lot around the island, because it was too cold that time of year. Because it’s in April, May you know? Chilling off a bit. 

CRAWFORD: During family holidays at Paterson Inlet - the same kind of general activities? 

FISHER: Swimming all the time. Swimming, and playing around in dinghies, hunting Possums with the Dogs, things like that. 

CRAWFORD: Did you ever do any fishing in the Inlet? 

FISHER: Not a lot. We used to go Floundering up at the Freshwater River. 

CRAWFORD: Seine nets?

FISHER: Drag nets, yeah. And also Scallop diving, there was a lot of that going on. Back in the North Arm. 

CRAWFORD: Ok. And all of that was pretty much consistent throughout your childhood?

FISHER: Yeah. 

CRAWFORD: At what age did you get a level of independence when your range increased? Access to a car or something like that? 

FISHER: At the age of 15.

CRAWFORD: What kinds of places did you go as a late teenager that perhaps you hadn’t gone as a younger kid? Did you drive up the coast? Mates you’d visit in different areas or different towns?

FISHER: Once we got a car, we used to do the districts around south. And the pubs, if we could get into them. Or we had mates in Riverton, we had places like that. We were drinking at that stage.

CRAWFORD: Did that affect the kind of places and things that you were doing around the water?

FISHER: Yes, it did. We went off the water a bit. 

CRAWFORD: Pardon me? 

FISHER: We took up drinking, instead of swimming. [laughs]

CRAWFORD: I understand. Socializing cut into your on-the-water time?

FISHER: Oh, absolutely! Yeah, yeah. It changed a lot after that. [laughs]

CRAWFORD: The girls and whatever - that was all inland?

FISHER: That’s right. 

CRAWFORD: Alright, that’s important. You said your Dad was a fisherman?

FISHER: Yes. 

CRAWFORD: At what point did you start going out with him?

FISHER: 1970 on the payroll - I was 15.  

CRAWFORD: You were on the payroll full-time then? You left school?

FISHER: Yes, yes, definitely. I was on the payroll, full-time. 

CRAWFORD: What region was he fishing, generally?

FISHER: Mainly Ruapuke, Codfish, the west coast [Stewart Island]. 

CRAWFORD: Fishing out of Bluff? That was his base?

FISHER: Yes. We lived in Bluff, and the boat was based in Bluff. 

CRAWFORD: And you fished Ruapuke, Codfish ...

FISHER: East Cape, Pegasus. Not a lot, not much up along the eastern shore here. It was manly the western side of Stewart Island for Crayfish. Codding was sort of anywhere, but we didn’t do a lot of Codding with the Old Man. It was mainly Crayfish.

CRAWFORD: Did you do any Crayfishing up Fiordland?

FISHER: The west coast, yeah.

CRAWFORD: What was the season for heading up there?

FISHER: It was more in the winter. We were up there in sort of June, July - at Nancy Sound. 

CRAWFORD: And would you go up for a couple of weeks, or a month at a time?

FISHER: Two to three weeks. 

CRAWFORD: What size vessel did your Dad have?

FISHER: 46-footer.

CRAWFORD: Geared primarily for Crayfish? Craypots?

FISHER: Oh, yeah. Absolutely. There was only Cray up there at that time. You can only carry so much gear, and it was mainly Crayfish pots. To get the numbers up. 

CRAWFORD: Did your Dad ever fish the Traps? Some of the outer islands?

FISHER: Yes. But that wasn't when I was with him. But he was working Pegasus in the 1940s - Codding. And they used to be out round these areas, handlining. And they used to see a lot of Sharks when they were out at Pegasus.

CRAWFORD: Ok. That’s good - thank you for bringing that up. We’ll come back to that in a bit. So, you were fishing full-time with your Dad, starting at the age of 15. How long did you fish with him for?

FISHER: Six years, and then I got me own. 

CRAWFORD: Then you got your own boat? 

FISHER: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: What size boat was that? 

FISHER: 40-feet. 

CRAWFORD: Was it a primarily Crayfishing boat?

FISHER: Yeah, yeah. Cray and Cod. I would have had it for about three or four years, and then we went into longlining for Greyboy Sharks. 

CRAWFORD: Before you started fishing for Greyboys, was it pretty much the same places that you fished with your Dad?

FISHER: Yes. In the general areas, but we were fishing a bit differently. There was areas that Dad didn’t work which we did investigate.

CRAWFORD: When you got your skipper's ticket, and you got your own vessel, did you also head back up to Fiordland?

FISHER: No, I went right to the source. And bombed the shit out of the Old Man. [laughs] Started at Codfish. It was me first load of gear out, was Codfish Island. And funnily enough - if there wasn’t any shagging at Codfish to create half caste Māoris, we wouldn’t be here today. And it’s on me Father’s side, and me Mother’s side. They originally come from Codfish Island. Zane would have told you that, because we hook into him through one of those links. 

CRAWFORD: Ok. In terms of Greyboy fishing, roughly when did you started doing that?

FISHER: I think it would have been about 1982-ish. 

CRAWFORD: The market changed or what?

FISHER: No, the fishery ... when it was blowing from the westward, a lot of our gear, in December, was pretty close in. Like 20 fathom in. So, if you got 20 or 30 knots of westerly, you couldn’t work it because it was too close in, and too rough, and you get washed on the rocks. I was a tiger for punishment, so instead of going home, we used to go around the bottom of the Cape, and come up to Broad Bay and Pegasus, and set longlines in the leeward side of the island. 

CRAWFORD: So it was longlines? Not setnets for the Greyboys?

FISHER: No, not setnets. They weren’t around then, because they hadn’t worked out how to set nets with these tides at that stage. In fact, we didn’t even know the Shark was there until longliners such as ourselves started bringing them in. We were coached into that by ... I think the first one that really start that was [Colin Anderson??] on the [Hathaway??]. He went down there with a 150-hook line, and got say 4-5 tonne of Greyboy. So, we all took an interest in that. Set up the same way, and went down, and done exactly what he did. And then setnetting come after that, when they knew that resource was really big. 

CRAWFORD: Ok. Prior to the setnets coming in, when you were running longline, what was the split between Crayfishing and longlining? Was it 80 percent Crayfishing, or less?

FISHER: It would be like probably 90. Yeah. Like our primary interest was Crayfish. It was only when the weather pushed us off their grounds. 

CRAWFORD: Fair enough. I’m presuming things stayed relatively similar for a spell. When was the next big change in your operations? Setnetting?

FISHER: Yes. We went into setnetting after. It was [Tucker Williams??] went down there with nets after two or three fouled attempts by the big netters who worked around in the bays, where they had no tide. 

CRAWFORD: Up here?

FISHER: [Toto’s Bay??], yep. They worked in here and up Te Waewae. But when they brought their nets down here, they started losing them, because the tides were taking them away. They wanted to get into there because they knew it was there. But [Tucker??] come down and he mucked around. Put up with all the bullshit, and got it right. Got the anchors weighted right, and the other systems, the bridle systems worked out. Then how to set them in the tides, mark them off, which end to lift first, and all this sort of stuff. 

CRAWFORD: Yeah, yeah. 

FISHER: So, he worked all that out. And that’s when the netting really come away.

CRAWFORD: What year was that?

FISHER: Would have been about ... shit. 

CRAWFORD: Mid-80s?

FISHER: Yeah. About '85.

CRAWFORD: Is that when you switched over to setnets?

FISHER: Yes. I switched over in '86. 

CRAWFORD: When you switched, was it still 90:10 percent, Cray:Cod?

FISHER: No. We started taking a bigger interest in it then, because the fishery was looking a bit [poat??] - Crayfish. We were getting quite a good return off the Sharks.

CRAWFORD: Maybe 70-30? 

FISHER: Yeah, it’d be 70-30 at the time. 70 Crayfish, 30 Shark. Yeah. 

CRAWFORD: Ok. What's the next thing that changed? Or was that pretty much the way it ran for a long period of time?

FISHER: We carried on up till the quotas. When the quota system come in, we threw the gear off and swapped the Shark quota with a guy who didn’t want to go Crayfishing anymore. We swapped our Shark quota for his Cray quota.

CRAWFORD: You went back to exclusively Crayfishing? 

FISHER: We went exclusively Crayfishing at that stage.

CRAWFORD: Roughly when was that? Late-80s? 

FISHER: No, it was in the '90s. I could look it all up. Sometime in the '90s. 

CRAWFORD: That's fine. Did you ever doing any commercial Pāua diving in your career?

FISHER: I was in the Pāua industry in the '80s, for three years. I think it was '86 to' 88. 

CRAWFORD: Relatively full-time?

FISHER: No, no. If the weather flattened out along the west side here, and the Crayfish deadened off, you sail a week of easterly - everybody else is coming around these shores here. They were very, very popular. 

CRAWFORD: Ok. What was the next big change?

FISHER: We started taking an interest back in the Codding industry. 

CRAWFORD: Codpotting?

FISHER: Yeah. Which we had done around the mid-80s, we were working a lot at the Traps. The late-80s, we were doing a lot of Codding as well. 

CRAWFORD: So, it would have been maybe 60 percent Crayfish, 20 percent Codpotting, 20 percent setnetting for Greyboys? Something like that? 

FISHER: Yeah. I’m never one for details ...

CRAWFORD: I don’t really care about the details. I care about the general patterns. 

FISHER: Yeah. The general pattern was like - when a fish price goes up, and there's a resource that’s always been there, and the technology or somebody’s mucking around has produced something - a mechanism to take it out quickly, to gain a freight in a hurry - that’s when people start jumping on. 

CRAWFORD: It was a market advantage?

FISHER: All these areas around here were virtually, what would you call it - looked on as "Oh, you can’t work Codpots in these areas, because the tides are too strong." Well, you know - you just build heavier Codpots, and bigger floats on them, and chuck'em over. And what do you do? You get full pots of Cod.

CRAWFORD: Yeah. 

FISHER: So, these areas are actually protected by this scenario in the head of people trying to Codpot it, but with inferior gear that didn’t work. They crossed it off. 

CRAWFORD: In the same way people thought you couldn’t use setnets for the Greyboys?

FISHER: Yes. The one guy come along and persevered. The other ones took off, because they lost thousands of dollar worth of Shark gear down there. And this guy’s determination won out, and turned that into a netting industry - all this around here. And a lot of the Sharkers call here, even today. 

CRAWFORD: Ok. What was the next big change?

FISHER: We built the [XS??] in 1997. We done two years really nailing Crayfish, because I had to stay on the high-price stuff. And there was a bit of fish about then. Except 1998, which was a fizzer. But anyway, we had to ... we made our commitment to the quota side of it, so we had to make sure we caught it.

CRAWFORD: That new vessel, how big was it? 

FISHER: 60-feet at the time. 

CRAWFORD: That's a big boat. 

FISHER: Yes, it is.

CRAWFORD: After a couple of years going full-on for Crayfish, when did Blue Cod come back into the picture?

FISHER: About the year 2000. We only worked the Cod at that stage, when the Crayfish weren't running. It was up to us whether you put the effort ... stay at home, when the Crayfish weren’t biting. Or go back out, and do some more time at sea. When the tides were right, and the weather was right, we go straight back down - straight out here and all around here. 

CRAWFORD: The Traps?

FISHER: Yeah. It's been our playground there for years. 

CRAWFORD: And that brings us up to the mid-2000s? 

FISHER: Earlier. Maybe 1990, we started getting really good results from the Codpotting. We had GPSs at that stage. We’d actually pinned in a lot of ground on the charts by previous years, being out there. But we could never really have a decisive mark, being so far off land. The radars were pretty ... you could only get two points on the radar - if you were lucky.

CRAWFORD: Yeah. 

FISHER: So, we were very much 'DR' - dead reckoning. But we did mark down patches of foul. 

CRAWFORD: When did GPS come in?

FISHER: They had the SatNav first, and that was around probably late 1980s. Yeah, maybe a bit before then.

CRAWFORD: When did you get GPS facility?

FISHER: We got a GPS ... I think it might have been the second year on the [Carmallita??], which would have been about 1990. All this area, we were starting to map it in. We had it broken right down - the heights and the fouls and all that. What potential they might have, as far as Crayfishing and Codding went. So, when we got out there to investigate it in the bigger boat, we could go straight to these areas without mucking around. And we actually hit some big strikes out there. Not just around the Traps, but wide of the Traps, south of the Traps.

CRAWFORD: How far south? 

FISHER: 15-25 mile. 

CRAWFORD: Ok - that’s south. Did you fish over at the Solanders, west over that way?

FISHER: Yes, done a lot of Solanders in the 1980s. Last year at the Solanders was 1985 - Crayfishing. We actually went back there netting for Sharks. We were trying different places. We were working up along the Bishops, places like that. Getting big hits there. You just started moving around. Once we got a taste for it ... you couldn’t always work down there, if the tides were anymore that 2.6 at that stage. Although they can work bigger tides now, because they've just upped the ante with the gear. But we didn’t know that at the time. We would go into areas that never had those big tide swings. When the tides got too hard down here, you just moved into softer tidal areas. And you were always looking to break new ground in.

CRAWFORD: Did you ever Codpot, or setnet for Greyboys, in Foveaux Strait? Titi Islands north?

FISHER: No, no. I never had any interest working the Straits. No, not for Codding or setnetting. Only from the Bishops back to the westward. 

CRAWFORD: Is that pretty much the pattern that brought you up to your most recent fishing? Or were there any other major changes in gear or place or targets?

FISHER: When the quotas for Crayfish come in, we had a quota that was quite substantial, which we could go and double it up as leverage to companies. Once you took that commitment on, you really had to stay at it until you done it - before you even thought about doing anything else. If you got it quickly, you would have time to do something else. But if not, you just had to hammer away at the Crayfish side. Some years you get time to do other stuff, some years you didn't - you know? Just opportunist. If the weather was right, the tides were right, you were straight to the Traps. Along with a lot of others, all waiting to pounce on the Traps, because that was the motherlode. 

CRAWFORD: And when conditions weren't right, you were fishing the other spots because of the wind or the tides?

FISHER: Well, yeah - that’s earlier on. In the last probably 12 years I haven’t Codded extensively like I used to. Because the industry sort of tipped back a bit. Running a big boat, it didn’t really warrant my time - that was running out at that stage - me getting older at that stage. Just going out there to catch something that you didn’t really need the income from.  So, we didn’t. Started to spend more time at home.

CRAWFORD: That was over the last ten years?

FISHER: Yes. 

CRAWFORD: A gradual decline?

FISHER: Yeah. 

CRAWFORD: And I think you said that your Boys, they’ve got their skippers’ tickets? They’re pretty much responsible for the vessel now?

FISHER: Yes, they are.

CRAWFORD: When were you pretty much out of the fishing? Two or three years ago? 

FISHER: Two seasons, two Cray seasons. This one will be finished at the end of March, so it’ll be officially two Cray seasons.

CRAWFORD: And that pretty much brings us up to now?

FISHER: Yeah.

CRAWFORD: Am I missing anything else? Did you spend any time doing other things, whether it was recreational ...

FISHER: We used to run Muttonbirders. 

CRAWFORD: You did some charter work?

FISHER: Up and down the island. And then have somebody take our boat home, lash it up to the wharf, and we would stay down at the island, and do the later part of the season. Probably the last month to three weeks. And then we’d either fly home, or get a ride home, or have somebody come down and pick us up. And we would pick up other birders and come home

CRAWFORD: Once again, Muttonbirding always ...

FISHER: Always going up and down. 

CRAWFORD: Always a big part of the annual cycle.

FISHER: Constant. 

CRAWFORD: Did you ever get into sailing or recreational boating or anything like that? 

FISHER: No. No time. 

2. EXPOSURE TO MĀORI/LOCAL/SCIENCE KNOWLEDGE SYSTEMS 

CRAWFORD: I'm going to ask you, on a general scale, to tell me to what extent Māori culture and knowledge has affected your understanding of the ocean and marine environment generally - 

FISHER: I would say ... as far as dietary goes, High. 

CRAWFORD: And what about Māori culture and understanding of the world, and the values. I’m not expecting you to say you’re the leading expert in Māori knowledge for the South Island or anything like that ...

FISHER: I mean I can’t even speak the lingo, you know? 

CRAWFORD: Ok, so let's rule out Very High and Very Low. Low, Medium or High?

FISHER: Well, probably Low. 

CRAWFORD: But I don’t think you can spend that much time Muttonbirding like you described, without the culture and knowledge seeping in substantially. 

FISHER: Well, we know what to do.

CRAWFORD: And you know about the patterns in the ecosystem. 

FISHER: It’s all based on what they did. And we always wonder how they did this or did that. Through the Science that they had at the time, to the Science we have now - we’re always comparing that to different situations. You think "How did the Old People get that up here?" "How did they live here?" "How did they get water to there?" You know? You're told to a certain point, but nothing’s been told that hasn’t had a Pakeha influence. We’re at a stage of this game, there’s always a Pakeha influence in our story. Because the White guys that came here first were Whalers and Sealers. And that’s where we all started from - as far as Europeans think. 

CRAWFORD: I've been told there was a very deliberate intention - in Māoridom - to marry into those Pakeha cultures. 

FISHER: Well, down here there was. Very clever down here. The other ones were probably ... Oh, I don’t know. But it's pretty multicultural down in Bluff here. Always has been.

CRAWFORD: The Bluff fishing fleet ... I’ve heard estimates, anywhere between 50-75 percent of the fleet is Māori. One way or another. 

FISHER: Yeah. And this was an international port, right from the day dot. 

CRAWFORD: Ok. In terms of Science culture and knowledge. What general level of influence on your understanding?

FISHER: Oh, Low probably. [laughs] No, I don’t class meself as a Science sort of person. I do wonder about things. Some things I’ll follow up, and some I don’t. When the answer does come along, I will put it on. Have that question ticked. 

CRAWFORD: But you also pick up technology quickly, right? 

FISHER: No, I don’t. Not technical stuff like that. 

CRAWFORD: But you use a GPS and electronic stuff like that?

FISHER: I use the basics. 

CRAWFORD: Ok. So, we’ll put you between Low and Medium, in terms of Science?

FISHER: Yeah. 

3. WHITE POINTER DISTRIBUTION AND ABUNDANCE

CRAWFORD: Back in the days of the fish processing plant at Pegasus, were there ever any interactions at Level 4? Either aggression or full-on attacks?

FISHER: No, the Old Man never mentioned anyone ... like, they used to row around on dinghies a lot there. They’d be getting Oysters and stuff like that. 

CRAWFORD: These were the old clinker dinghies?

FISHER: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, absolutely. Great dinghy. 

CRAWFORD: Where else would your Dad have said were 'sharky' regions? Places where White Pointers would aggregate, back in the day? 

FISHER: Mainly Mason’s. 

CRAWFORD: Mason’s Bay? 

FISHER: Yeah, Mason's Bay. They're big on them there. 

CRAWFORD: What did he figure would have attracted them there? 

FISHER: Rookeries. A Seal rookery there. 

CRAWFORD: Back in the day, the rookery there was a big one? 

FISHER: Yeah. They breed pups there. Just in this bit here. And obviously, that’s the draw card. 

CRAWFORD: Prior to us talking today, had you ever heard about White Pointers responding to a dead White Pointer by vacating the site. Moving miles away?

FISHER: No, that’s the first I’ve heard of it, was today when we talked. Which I found very interesting. That goes to show you how the self-preservation side of it works, doesn’t it?

CRAWFORD: It definitely has a lot of people scratching their heads.

FISHER: The biggest teeth in town. But they don’t want confrontation. 

CRAWFORD: One thing that has come up in a lot of these interviews, is that these White Pointers are not silly. 

FISHER: No. 

CRAWFORD: If they perceive a threat, they’ll respond appropriately. If that means high-tailing it, then they’ll do that too. 

FISHER: They'll do that. 

CRAWFORD: I want go back to your Dad and the old-timers in general ...

FISHER: Yeah. Mom had a lot of Uncles that worked out of Halfmoon Bay. Before that, when Dad worked for some of them, when he was a boy. And they all caught Sharks. 

CRAWFORD: They caught White Pointers where?

FISHER: Halfmoon Bay. Mom’s Uncle [Honi Hanni??], he had - oh, there’s photos of it - the big one hanging up at the end of the wharf there. It was caught when she was a girl, probably 70-odd years ago. So, they were catching them then, if they could. If they had enough time to muck around with them. 

CRAWFORD: Well it seems to be two things. That the animals were coming into the bay, and that they were being caught when they did. 

FISHER: Whether they caught it in the bay or not, I don’t know. I think she said they dragged it in. Caught it somewhere else. 

CRAWFORD: Not really clear where, but it would have been within region of towing?

FISHER: Oh, absolutely. Because these guys didn’t muck around. If something was going to really consume their day, and at the end of it there was no sale value in it, was only just a bit of an odyssey for the people to see - they would probably have preferred to keep on working. But every now and again, I suppose they’d hang one up for the people to see. 

CRAWFORD: Ok. In your Dad’s era, that generation - what other places were known to be aggregations for White Pointers?

FISHER: [repeated taps on map]

CRAWFORD: Ruapuke?

FISHER: Yeah. He spent a lot of time here when he was about 14, which would be 70 years ago. They used to have Caroline Bay. There. There used to be a Shark called Caroline Jack. Was that mentioned?

CRAWFORD: Yes, it has come up. And that leads to an interesting thing in terms of when Sharks get named. That’s not the only White Pointer that has had a local name. 

FISHER: Yeah. 

CRAWFORD: Did that animal have some type of scar ... or how would they distinguish that Shark from another Shark? 

FISHER: Oh, they knew it. I don't know what the markings were, because I actually never seen it myself. I couldn’t work out how the they didn’t shoot it. [chuckles] Maybe just give them a quick look, and it was cunning enough to ... 

CRAWFORD: Could have been. The second thing that a guy like me thinks of, is this issue of residency. That they might take up a place for a period of time. Could be weeks, could be months, could be off and on here for a few weeks, then gone for a month, then back for three weeks. 

FISHER: Yeah, yeah.

CRAWFORD: But then also maybe year after year. That you might see the same Shark - or what you believe is the same Shark - over years. Did you ever hear about Smokey Joe?

FISHER: No. 

CRAWFORD: Another animal that got a name, got associated with a place, got seen over time. The fish ecology side of it, I'm interested to know if these animals are setting up territory in a place. If they do, you've got to defend your territory. If so, there must be reasons for it. Whether it’s feeding, or access to females, or whatever the case may be. 

FISHER: Who sets it up? Does the female set it up, or does the male set it up? 

CRAWFORD: We don't know.

FISHER: That’s the interesting point. Because the females are bigger, aren’t they?

CRAWFORD: It’s an important question. Before I forget ... Pegasus was important, but that was for very specific reasons, with the fish plant. You mentioned Mason Bay, and Codfish Island - really the whole northwest corner of Stewart Island. 

FISHER: Yeah, yeah. Absolutely. Right along the edge. 

CRAWFORD: And now you've said Ruapuke?

FISHER: Ruapuke, yes. 

CRAWFORD: The shoreline you’re pointing, does that include this northeastern shore? 

FISHER: Yeah. Right out by Port William. There's been a lot seen out by Port William. They would go right back to when they were Whaling in the 1800s. There was talk of the Sharks would go in there and ...

CRAWFORD: Feeding on the Whale carcasses? Or trying to?

FISHER: Yeah, yeah, yeah. 

CRAWFORD: What about the Titi Islands, the northern Titi Islands?

FISHER: Don't know much about them. Other than this is where their cage operation is. 

CRAWFORD: But back in the day, were they known to be particularly sharky? 

FISHER: Oh, I think they were. I think the guys seen these Sharks, but they didn’t go on about them all the time.

CRAWFORD: But there have been lots of Sharks around there?

FISHER: Yeah. They didn’t count them. They had no way of knowing what the individuals or whatever, you know?

CRAWFORD: Yes. And that’s part of the newer information that people are going to find interesting.

FISHER: The guys at [Halfmoon] Bay would know more about that. 

CRAWFORD: Yes, ok.

FISHER: I mean [Arnie??] can tell you stories, what Mom said about Halfmoon Bay. They used to have swimming competitions, and there were two fish factories right at the wharf, plus a butcher shop, chucking all their gunk into the drink. That would be the best chum in town for a White Pointer. They must have been there.

CRAWFORD:  Did the old-timers talk about seeing White Pointers in Halfmoon Bay?

FISHER: Yes. 

CRAWFORD: Did they figure that they were there because of the chum of the fish processing plant? 

FISHER: Probably. But were they going to shut that down? [laughs] No. Shut the factories down? I don’t think so. 

CRAWFORD: From the previous generation, were there ever descriptions of White Pointers in the bay getting into that Level 4 attitude or aggression? 

FISHER: No, no. Mom said there was never anyone ever bitten, that she knew or heard of. Or even chased out of the water. I asked her that this morning, I rang her up just to go through all that - just to make sure I got that right. And she’s got her full faculty, so she remembers it well.

CRAWFORD: Alright. What about Horseshoe Bay? Same kind of thing?

FISHER: Don’t know much about Horseshoe Bay, as far as that goes. 

CRAWFORD: What about Paterson Inlet? 

FISHER: Spent a lot of time up there. Never seen any. We spent a lot of time around the Glories. Up the Freshwater, up this one here. 

CRAWFORD: All the time that you spent growing up in Paterson Inlet, you never saw any White Pointers there?

FISHER: No. The Old Man allowed us to swim anywhere. We would jump off the boat - anywhere we were - and swim to shore. It would be like a 50-100 metre dash. 

CRAWFORD: So, it wasn’t just you not seeing them. Nobody you knew back in the day saw White Pointers up there? 

FISHER: No, no. I never heard. A lot of us tied up together there, and I never heard. [Lloyd Young??], he was like probably like ten years older than the Old Man. The Old Lady said he was ten years further back. I never ever heard him mention anyone had been chased or anything. 

CRAWFORD: Ok. I’m trying to remember - when did the fish farm go in? The one in Big Glory? 

FISHER: Oh, in the '80s sometime.

CRAWFORD: So, that’s after you were a kid, going over there for your family trips.

FISHER: Yeah. We weren't looking for them. They could be there. Like I said, if we want to see a Shark in Mason, all we've got to do is make sure we got a bit of chum - like old fish, old bait, just chuck it over the side. And sure enough, if there's any around, they’ll head in.

CRAWFORD: Right. Were there any places that you knew of, that were typical fish cleaning stations for the fishing boats? If the guys were cleaning Cod on the way back in, or moored?

FISHER: In Halfmoon Bay, I wouldn’t know. Squizzy would know more about that. He's probably got all that information. Though that chumming was going on all the time. 

CRAWFORD: Ok. In terms of full-on Level 4s, any other stories about a White Pointer absolutely giving a hard time to people - anywhere in this general region? 

FISHER: No. None at all. 

CRAWFORD: So, what the hell’s with that? How can you be in a place with such a density of White Pointers - and no Level 4s?

FISHER: Well, especially lately actually ... The fact is, there’s been a lot more hits in Aussie, lately. They reckon some of those Sharks that are doing it, have actually been in this area here at some stage through this tagging, or these beacons they put on them. Is that right? 

CRAWFORD: You brought up two things. One is the tagging program, and to the extent that the White Pointers are going up to Fiji and Tonga and over to the Great Barrier Reef. Whether or not these individual White Pointers are in the same population or not - we’re just starting to figure that out. Most of the animals that have been tagged here have gone up to the Eastern side of Australia, but the extent to which they’re mixing, we don't know.

FISHER: There’s one thing I’ve sort of asked meself. The Sharks have been caught up along the Saddle area here, there was a lot of netting going on about that time.

CRAWFORD: The '70s?

FISHER: No, no. Late-80s, early-90s. I know for a fact there was a lot of Sharks caught here, White Pointers in this area and down here in the Shark nets - the Greyboy Shark nets. And also, there had been White Pointers tangled up in longlines, before the netters. Along the shore here. It was a time when there wasn’t a lot of Greyboys caught, but there was a shitload of Dogfish. So, I’ve always thought that these White Pointers actually [hoe??] into these Dogfish as well. This is just something that I’ve thought. You know, you try to work out. There’s no Seals here. What the hell are the White Pointers doing hanging round there? 

CRAWFORD: Remember what I was doing with the question about the previous generations, where were the dense aggregations ...

FISHER: And why? 

CRAWFORD: That’s the point. To try and figure that out. 

FISHER: There’s no chumming there. And there’s no Seals. 

CRAWFORD: Remember when I asked you about down at Mason Bay?

FISHER: Seals. There's a rookery, yeah.

CRAWFORD: Yes, Seals. And then you go up to Codfish ...

FISHER: Yeah. Lots of rookeries there. Yeah, yeah. 

CRAWFORD: But then you go up to the northern side ...

FISHER: No Seals. 

CRAWFORD: At least not back at that point in time, rIght?

FISHER: Oh, there’s fuck all. I don't think I've ever seen a Seal along here. 

CRAWFORD: So, what are the White Pointers doing up there, if there are no Seals?

FISHER: I reckon it’s Dogfish. When you get Dogfish, it's like an infestation. If you’re a Shark-netter, you fucking dread the minute the first segment of the net comes up - and there's fucking Dogs. Worth about 20 cents a kilo.

CRAWFORD: Because if you get one Dogfish, you’re going get ...

FISHER: You get tons of them. And they're extremely tough to get out of the net. You’re there for hours. And, of course, your nets have been chomped around.

CRAWFORD: Do you have any direct reason to believe that White Pointers feed on Dogsharks or Greyboys? Smaller Sharks of any other kind?

FISHER: No. I can only put down for them being in this area - and they’ve been caught a lot here. And this Smokey Jack, whatever he’s called Smokey Joe. There’s been a lot of White Pointers caught up along there.

CRAWFORD: Yes, there has. 

FISHER: And I’ve always wondered what are they doing there. 

CRAWFORD: What about the Traps, and that region? Are there White Pointers down there?

FISHER: There will be possibly, I don’t know. I’ve never seen any. 

CRAWFORD: Not based on your time down there? 

FISHER: No. And I spent quite a bit of time there, cleaning Cod. There’s been a lot of Shark netting down there. And I don’t know of any of them who’ve caught any White Pointers down there, like they’ve been caught up here. They catch a lot of Blue Sharks, but we’re not talking about them are we? One year with the Old Man, we took swimmers, from Barracouta Point, and they landed around about the Saddle. They were doing a relay. I think there was about ten swimmers in that - one would do fifteen minutes, another one would get in. There was me and the other crew - Dad's crew - we were rowing a clinker dinghy, and we had those big long rods with the powerheads on - in case one turned up. We never seen any. You know that water along here is only like 20 fathom, 120 feet. So, if something’s going along there, and the White Pointer's looking up ... I mean, they would see you, wouldn’t they? 120 feet? If they were on the bottom?

CRAWFORD: Based on what people are telling me - absolutely. And if they were on the bottom, or if they were cruising, and they were looking up ... If they sensed something on the surface, they check it out. They are attracted. They are very curious animals. 

FISHER: We were only going along as fast as the swimmers. We never seen one that day. And we were in the Straits there for ... this is when the Ocean Beach [freezerworks] was going. The Ocean Beach stories - Sharks there. I’ve never caught Sharks myself along here. I don’t know whether the guys that did actually opened them up.

CRAWFORD: When you and others were longlining, did you ever have White Pointers getting wrapped up in the longlines?

FISHER: No. Some did though. There was one caught up off Christmas Village. Yeah, [Jimmy Ryan??] caught that one.

CRAWFORD: The White Pointers would take some of the fish that were on the longline?

FISHER: Possibly. Mainly Dogs, I think there were, on that line that Jimmy ran.

CRAWFORD: Did you ever run into a situation where you’d be pulling fish up, and you’d be getting only heads?

FISHER: Yes. 

CRAWFORD: Did you ever see what was doing it?

FISHER: We just assumed they were Sevengillers. 

CRAWFORD: Why would you have assumed it was Sevengillers, as opposed to anything else - Makos, or whatever else?

FISHER: We sort of thought if it was a bigger fish it would have cut though the line, because it was only like 7 millimetre line. 

CRAWFORD: Ok. Clean cuts or ragged? 

FISHER: You’d get the odd one with just the head, but mostly they’d get the guts chewed out of them. They go straight in for about here, every time. 

CRAWFORD: Did you ever hear about Joe Cave’s nets?

FISHER: I know he used to catch a few out off Ocean Beach. 

CRAWFORD: The idea that he rigged them up specifically for White Pointers - did you ever see those nets being fished?

FISHER: No, but I seen the nets. I can understand how they worked. 

CRAWFORD: Did you ever hear the story that there were some of these Sharks that came into Halfmoon Bay on a fairly regular basis and he set his nets ...

FISHER: He got one of them. He had one hanging on the wharf not long after that. So, they’ve got these Sharks up - you know, pretty much the whole town is out to see this. People taking their photos and whatever. People start saying "How much for a tooth?" They start working that out. Yeah. That started the twenty grand per jaw. 

CRAWFORD: I don’t know anything about that. 

FISHER: That’s what I heard. 

CRAWFORD: White Pointer jaws will go for a healthy price. Did you hear if what happened when they cut them up?

FISHER: No. 

CRAWFORD: I've been told they were loaded with Cod frames. 

FISHER: Oh really? See - there you go. Indirect chumming. 

CRAWFORD: Less than a mile from Dead Man Bay. 

FISHER: Well, I’m not surprised at all. 

CRAWFORD: And it’s not just scavenging, but it’s scavenging on the fishery waste. We were feeding this things, and we didn’t even know it.

FISHER: Well, we’ve known it. 

CRAWFORD: Yes. And yet, rarely any Level 4 behaviour then. They’d just come in and hoover up the Cod frames. Maybe fishermen should be doing things differently. Maybe they shouldn’t be having these cleaning stations so close to Halfmoon Bay.

FISHER: But they’ve been doing it for years. There’s no way I’d swim around in Halfmoon Bay. There’s no way I’d take a swim around there, knowing, like even before all that - because you know that these guys are constantly cleaning fish in there. A lot of them. And have been for years. We never jumped over the side at Mason’s. [laughs] You don’t swim at Ruggedy. 

CRAWFORD: No, you don’t. 

FISHER: No, you don’t - because you know that they’re there. 

CRAWFORD: Pāua divers?

FISHER: Like when I was in the Pāua industry in the '80s. 

CRAWFORD: The point is that, out of all the places you would not swim - Halfmoon Bay is one. All the way in at Bathing Beach? That’s not a place where you would have your kids swimming? 

FISHER: Funnily enough, I’ve been silly and I’ve taken me Grandkids into [Bungaree Hut??], to swim on the beaches there. There’s like this little - almost a lagoon thing. 

CRAWFORD: Like a pool?

FISHER: Yeah, but it’s quite deep. Like parts as deep as this room, but it’s got kelp - that sort of thing. But that wouldn’t stop anything coming in. There’s a bit of a gap you can come in, about as wide as that door there - where you can cut through with your dinghy and outboard.

CRAWFORD: Right. This really puts a head on the issue. I mean, because you’re a Parent and a Grandparent ... It’s one thing to talk about risk to Pāua divers - you’ve dove like that, and there’s places where ...

FISHER: After seeing Sharks, and caught Sharks ...

CRAWFORD: But did it change the way that you thought about it? "Thinking back, I don't think I would go Pāua diving in those places"?

FISHER: Oh, you thought about it each day, once you hit the drink. "I hope it’s not going to be a Shark day.” I didn’t see any while I was doing it. But swimming a long way from the shore out - if it was a bit rough ...

CRAWFORD: Exposed?

FISHER: Exposed, yeah. Going across deep water, you used to think about it.

CRAWFORD: What about the Titi Islands? I realize you weren’t a full-time Pāua diver, but did other Pāua divers talk about them there - back in the day?

FISHER: There’s a Seal rookery around here. I’ve seen Sharks - a Shark there, but I don’t know if it was a White Pointer or not. It didn’t come up far enough to really identify it. It wasn’t over 10 feet. Could have been a Blue or something like that. There was a big one seen off the end here. Fluff’s brother, they were cleaning out there one time, and they seen a big one out there. I’ve seen Seals floating around with segments ripped off them.  

CRAWFORD: Where are the places you have seen Seal carcasses or Seal pieces? 

FISHER: We’ve seen one recently around here. 

CRAWFORD: The southern Titi Islands?

FISHER: Yeah. And Ruapuke.

CRAWFORD: Any Seal carcasses or bits on the front end of Paterson and Halfmoon?

FISHER: No. We don’t really frequent there that much.

CRAWFORD: But you would have heard? Maybe?

FISHER: Well no, not all the time.  I mean you see a Seal with a bit ripped off it, or one floating around.

CRAWFORD: Here’s something for you. Realizing that throughout your career, it’s primarily around Crayfish - but you’ve done a significant amount of Codpotting as well. When you were cleaning your Cod, did you ever see any Cod with bits and pieces of Seal in them?

FISHER: No. We don’t really ... when you’re cleaning a lot of Cod, you don’t get too into that. Otherwise you may as well take a trip, you know?

CRAWFORD: With White Pointer distribution and abundance, I’m interested about patterns in space, but also patterns and time. Is there a seasonality to these White Pointers here in New Zealand? Are they here all year-round? 

FISHER: Well, who would know?

CRAWFORD: You would know. You’ve talked about seeing a White Pointer - and I was surprised when you said June. 

FISHER: Yeah. June, July. Mason’s actually. We were steaming in there one day. We went in to get some gear - that would have been about the end of June. So that’s in the middle of winter, isn’t it? There was one swimming out, as we were going in. 

CRAWFORD: That’s why every time you told me a White Pointer story, I asked you roughly what year and what time of year.

FISHER: Yeah. The year - well, we had the new one then, and that would be twelve years ago. 

CRAWFORD: In terms of seasonality though, there are at least some White Pointers around here throughout the year.

FISHER: I’ll bet there is. 

CRAWFORD: Well that’s one example right there. 

FISHER: Yeah, I suppose it is. 

CRAWFORD: But there are more White Pointers in the summer? 

FISHER: The Old Man always said that. You’re more likely, if you were in the anchorages, to see them December-ish on.

CRAWFORD: Was there any pattern specifically in terms of the size of the Sharks? Or could they distinguish males and females?

FISHER: No, no. He wasn’t really into that. They were either big or small. 

CRAWFORD: Was there a pattern between big and small? 

FISHER: Not that we wrote down. Like I said, at Mason’s there was an 18-footer caught the night before we caught an 11. It was 11 feet, the one we caught the next night. 

CRAWFORD: You ever see any really small White Pointers?

FISHER: No. The netters do though. *Olaf Nilsen, you’ve had a yarn with him? I’m sure they caught something under ten feet. Did he mention that? 

CRAWFORD: Yep.

FISHER: Which we were all very interested with. The ears perked up when we heard that. We’d never seen a small White Pointer. Eleven feet - that would have been the smallest I’ve seen.

CRAWFORD: Any other instances of other people seeing small White Pointers - that you recall? 

FISHER: There was one, but I can’t remember whether it was in this region. I don’t know. 

CRAWFORD: That’s fine. In this Foveaux Straight-Stewart Island region, have you seen a fair number of Basking Sharks? 

FISHER: Absolutely. Very numerous in the '70s, from November through to January.

CRAWFORD: Whereabouts would they have been, in the highest aggregations?

FISHER: Biggest concentration would have been in Mason's Bay. We counted up around 60, definitely at least 50.

CRAWFORD: Were they feeding at the time? Do you remember?

FISHER: Yes. Yes, they were. They were feeding in Mason's Bay.

CRAWFORD: What other places do you recall having seen numbers of Basking Sharks?

FISHER: We used to see them quite regularly at Ruggedy Passage. In and around Codfish. And we weren't always looking for them, but you'd look out and see two or three. And then you might see more, you might see one. That was happening all the time in the late-70s. Well, from the earlier periods fishing with the Old Man, and they seemed to trail off around about 1990. Even before then. I haven't seen any, in this area, for probably 15 years. Not one. The last time I seen the Basking Sharks in Mason's Bay, we actually swam ashore off the boat, me and the crew. And we were sitting on the rocks, having a yarn. ... Well, there you go. Who's worried about the White Pointers now? I just jumped off the boat and swam ashore, right? So anyway, I was sitting on the rocks, having a yarn - as it was stinking hot. Pristine waters, and glistening. Next minute, this big fin started going past. And for us looking out. We knew it was a Basking Shark. But we just had that feeling it mightn't be. [chuckles]

CRAWFORD: In terms of distinguishing features, how did you know it was a Basking Shark?

FISHER: The fin. The shape of the fin. A floppier, thicker, sort of a grey, shitty-brown colour.

CRAWFORD: Ok. When you're in a boat, looking down, other than the big gaping mouth if it's feeding ... In terms of coloration, how do you tell the difference between a Basking Shark and a White Pointer?

FISHER: It's more browny, I think. It's been a few years since I've seen one.

CRAWFORD: Ok. Back in the day, when you were young, from your Dad’s days - the freezerworks at Ocean Beach was fully operational? And it was mostly processing Lamb?

FISHER: Yeah, yeah. 

CRAWFORD: What do you know about the blood and the offal that was released from that freezerworks?

FISHER: There’s a pipe went straight out the back. There was no holding ponds. It didn’t go into the harbour, it went out the back. She's a downhill run for them these years.

CRAWFORD: Were you around, back in the day, when the freezerworks was still running? 

FISHER: Oh shit, yeah. I had mates work up there and that. 

CRAWFORD: Did you see Ocean Beach when it was receiving that kind of effluent? 

FISHER: No, I never really went around there. I didn’t go around there bugger all. I was like "Fuck that. Not for Shark boys." You wouldn't eat anything from there, like Pāuas or anything like that. Or we wouldn’t, because we'd get fresh Pāua somewhere else. 

CRAWFORD: Was Ocean Beach known to be ‘sharky’? 

FISHER: Not really. Not as far as I know. 

CRAWFORD: You’ve got this blood and bits and pieces going out?

FISHER: Well, I think I might have seen the odd one. 

4. WHITE POINTER ENCOUNTERS - DIRECT EXPERIENCES

CRAWFORD: What was the first time that you remember hearing about or seeing a White Pointer in the wild?

FISHER: Six.

CRAWFORD: Where were you?

FISHER: At the West Coast. 

CRAWFORD: Roughly where?

FISHER: Nancy Sound. 

CRAWFORD: Six years old - were you with your Dad? 

FISHER: Yeah. 

CRAWFORD: On his boat while he was Crayfishing? What happened?

FISHER: Well, it’s pretty hard to say exactly. We were lifting a pot, and I was just sort of mucking around on deck. Sitting on the hatch somewhere. The next minute, all this bloody commotion was going on. And this big Shark broke surface - just alongside the boat. Must have followed a pot up, or something. And that’s the first sort of excitement ... I could see the Elders being really excited. I knew there was something really significant then, that these things held over. 

CRAWFORD: When you say 'Elders' you mean ...

FISHER: Well, me Parents. This one was ... well, according to me Father, was one of the biggest he’d ever seen. He was talking 20 feet plus. At that stage, I never had a size gauge in my head. 

CRAWFORD: No. You were six years old. 

FISHER:  Yeah. 

CRAWFORD: And you had not heard about White Pointers before that? 

FISHER: No, I don't think so. It was the first impact, that you'd actually like "Oh. We'll lock that one in."

CRAWFORD: Yeah, for sure. [Discussion about project classification levels for human encounters with White Pointers: Level 1-Observation, Level 2-Swim-By, Level 3-Interest, Level 4-Intense] That first time that you saw a White Pointer, you had the impression - or your Dad had the impression - it was following the pot up?

FISHER: Yeah. 

CRAWFORD: As you were lifting it, did it hang around? Circle the boat?

FISHER: No. 

CRAWFORD: So, it was more than a Level 1 - a Level 2, maybe a Level 3?

FISHER: Yeah, I don’t know. It could have been swimming along the water maybe. I was six, so you know - can’t really run scenarios through. I just had a look. He still talks about it - the Old Man. 

CRAWFORD: Anywhere else that you and your Dad had seen White Pointers?

FISHER: [Waituna??]. One time down in Hellfire - Little Hellfire. Actually, south of that. He shot one with a 22. 

CRAWFORD: Your Dad did? 

FISHER: Yeah. While I was ashore, hunting. 

CRAWFORD: Why did he shoot it? 

FISHER: Well, I was ashore hunting. [chuckles]

CRAWFORD: It was to make sure you came back? 

FISHER: It was only a little dinghy, about half the size of this table [both laugh]

CRAWFORD: And the Shark was in shallow enough water?

FISHER: Yeah, yeah. He lured it in. 

CRAWFORD: How? 

FISHER: I'm not sure how he did it. Probably a bit of bait or something. 

CRAWFORD: I’ve heard some stories from the islanders about people putting newspaper on the water ...

FISHER: Oh, I’ve seen him do that - in Smokey. We caught that one. 

CRAWFORD: So, you put out a piece of newspaper ...

FISHER: Just to get it coming up. We were working the Bishops, this was the first year I was with him actually. It must have been 1970. It was just me and the Old Man and the Old Lady. And I saved all the old rotten bait. It was in January, we were after females [Crayfish], so we’re hard into the Bishops. There wasn’t a lot happening, so there was a lot of rotten bait. I actually tubbed all that back up, and we put fresh bait and booted the bag over - you know, the old stuff. We layed in at Smokey, because it was a light easterly. I just dumped it all over the side, and we dropped the anchor. We started tailing the Crayfish - we were tailing then. And I kept looking over the side, kept looking over the side, and sure enough - there's this big fucking Shark comes along underneath the boat. When I looked over, I just seen the tip of its nose, and then it just kept coming out, out, out, out. And its fins and everything like that ... yeah, that was fucking awesome. So anyway, I’m yelling out “Hey! There’s a fucking Shark there” He gets up off the deck, because he’s on his hands and knees tailing. "Righto. We'll get the fucking hook out. He used to have a crowbar that had been fashioned into a hook. High tensile steel. He used to have a Groper head - at the ready, all the time. Had the Groper head wired onto it, had the chain on it, and we used to keep the [float up out of it??], because we had freezers then - freezing onsite. The hook was always ready to go. So, we attached a hard Japanese float on it. Thirty fathom of 12-mil line, half-inch. Threw it out. Took a couple turns around the boat. Shark comes back along. The Old Man threw some newspaper out. It come up, put its nose on it - just went along, and went back down again. We watched it go away, along the beach just outside the breakers. It would go right along, and then it would disappear in the black-and-white bottom. You couldn’t see it once the bottom darkened off. And then, about 10 or 15 minutes later, it would be back again. Back along, just outside the breakers. You could see it clear as a bell. Because the water’s really clear in the sand. And then it would disappear again, because you couldn’t see it against the dark bottom. Anyway, after a wee while, the sun was about to go down, and he come back again. The Old Man says "He’s going to take it. You watch." Sure enough, it come along and just [hurried it up??]. Soon as it got onto the hook, the Old Man just pinched and took another turn. Shark hit the hook. Stopped for a second, and he let the turns off - and away it went. He just kept a couple, three turns on - and just kept tweaking him every now and again. It would go out, and then it would start to circle back in, he take the turns back off, pull all the slack back in, and then start it again. Took about three or four times. So, me and the Old Lady pulled alongside and he shot it. Just like that. BANG. He had a head on him about that wide ...

CRAWFORD: That’s three quarters of a metre?

FISHER: Yeah. Teeth about the size of a matchbox. That's one of the biggest ones I’ve seen caught. And he reckons it would have been ... well, when we pulled we could only get the head out the water. Not quite to the wings - the wings were still in the water, or just out. We had it pulled out just with the Crayfish boom. We had a surge drum - you know, hydraulics it's all belt driven. So, they were smoking - the [belts??] were smoking just to get it up to there. We left it there for a while, and had tea. We gave these guys ... they were netting for bait, they were in West Smokey. And they're on this piss, waiting for their nets to fill up with Greenbone. What they were doing with the Greenbone was just boxing it up, put it down below, and freeze it -because they were going to take off up to Breaksea Sound for a Crayfish trip. So, they had to stock their load up with bait, catch the boat and then split - which would take a couple or three days. They would set their nets in the morning, get pissed, go out rowing and get their nets and shake the bait out and set them again. So anyway, we give them a yell, and they come over, and we’ve ripped the head off at that stage - still had it sort of lashed up. They come alongside, and lashed it up to their boat, and steamed their way back over to West Smokey, and they were going cut it up for bait. There wasn’t much left of it the next morning. Other Sharks had come in and eaten it. So, I was wondering about that story you said about Edwards Island when it got ripped to bits.

CRAWFORD: That’s exactly what I was thinking when you were telling your story. Let's rewind just a little bit. Your Dad’s motivation for shooting that Shark when you were on shore ...

FISHER: "The only good White Pointer’s a dead one.’ 

CRAWFORD: That line has come up several times. Especially from the old-timers. Back in the day was it the case that, if you saw a White Pointer, and it came close you took a shot?

FISHER: Well, if you had a hook - you’d hook it first. 

CRAWFORD: You’d hook it so you’d have proximity to get a shot? What was the purpose of hooking, if it was just to straight kill the animal and you shot it?

FISHER: Well, the teeth. 

CRAWFORD: That’s what I was getting at. There was a harvest. Was it a trophy?

FISHER: No, not a trophy. It was the teeth - for pendants, earrings. That’s all that was in it. 

CRAWFORD: More of a cultural thing? 

FISHER: Yes. We’ve never ever had a Shark jaw hanging up on the wall, or anything like that. The Old Man was never interested in that. It was always ... he either buried the jaws or boiled them up in a copper. And then extracted the teeth. The rest of it went ... who knows. 

CRAWFORD: In terms of the teeth, was this something that was a cultural thing in your family - that went way back?

FISHER: Oh, I’d say so. Well, what they were doing with the teeth - they were actually dressed up with gold. Hung around by a chain. But they weren't done up in a Māori-fied tana sort of style. They were actually quite a [jersey??]-looking piece of jewelry. And there's a lot of the girls who are wearing their Great-Grandmother's Shark's teeth. 

CRAWFORD: In terms of the animal, they said before that the only good Shark is a dead Shark. Was that for animals that were approaching, or just in general? 

FISHER: In general. Because the fact was, when the Old Man and them used to fish, they used to go ashore a lot on dinghies. They used to net a lot in dinghies for bait. And they’d caught White Pointers, or had White Pointers come to them, when they’d been lifting nets. And this is in very, very shallow water. 

CRAWFORD: In a very small boat. 

FISHER: Yeah. So, they think "Well, we kill that Shark over here. Then when I’m netting down there two or three or ten years down the track, it’s not going to be around to ..."

CRAWFORD: And in that sense, it's more of a risk management technique than anything. 

FISHER: Well, really it’s just the mentality. I don’t think it’s management as such "We must kill six White Pointers a year, and it’ll reduce our risk." If they had a chance to kill one, they’d kill it. 

CRAWFORD: Ok. Let’s go back to the idea that this carcass, after your Dad had killed it ...

FISHER: We’d cut the head off. 

CRAWFORD: Hooked it, shot it, cut the head off?

FISHER: Yeah. 

CRAWFORD: And then it was the other boat that took the carcass? 

FISHER: Yeah, yeah. 

CRAWFORD: When was it that the other White Pointers were feeding on the carcass? 

FISHER: At night. Through the night. 

CRAWFORD: While the other boat had it hanging off their boat?

FISHER: Yeah. They woke up the next morning, there wasn’t anything to cut up. There was shit all. The liver side of it ... went straight in for the liver, and chewed the guts clean out. 

CRAWFORD: Other Sharks were doing the chewing? Or other White Pointers?

FISHER: Don't know. They don’t know, because they were drunk anyway. And they were asleep. When they got up in the morning, it would have been pulled to pieces. 

CRAWFORD: But in terms of Sharks in that place, if there were ...

FISHER: Possibly could have been Sevengillers.

CRAWFORD: Could have been. 

FISHER: Yeah.

FISHER: But up the north end of [Stewart] Island. I still ask meself that question. I ask meself, but I probably should have asked some of the guys who actually caught these Sharks up here. What did they have in their guts. Because when you pull them out of the water by the tail - and some of them actually did bring them home, they had big booms that they could block-and-tackle them up. And of course, the contents - they usually took out their guts. 

CRAWFORD: Just naturally, or they would slice them?

FISHER: No, you don’t have to - it just rolls out.

CRAWFORD: When it’s tail first?

FISHER: Yeah, yeah. Normally it's Seal sections, you know? Or old rotten bait, is another one. We caught one at Mason’s here one time. A 12-footer, and it was after a night that an 18-footer had been caught and shot. And the very next night, we went in ... and these guys are telling this story about this big fucking Shark that they’d shot, but it broke the hook. They were all pleased that they got about five or six shots into it. And it swam away. So anyway, we were in there for a while. It was early evening, beautiful oily calm night. Sandy bottom and you’re only in water about this deep. 

CRAWFORD: We’re talking two fathom? 

FISHER: Yep. So, it’s just like looking through a window. In fact, at low water a 7-foot boat would touch the bottom. So anyway, we were in there. Everyone was Codding at that stage. It was two boats from Riverton, and the Old Man had a big wooden boat then - the [Misty Lee??]. We were Crayfishing. I think I was only twelve then. There was three other Cod boats, but one of them had been in there the night before, and they caught this ... What they did was, they were actually on Fluff's - has he got the Gypsy? Andrew has. Andrew Leask, have you interviewed him? 

CRAWFORD: Not yet.

FISHER: That’s Fluff’s brother. But anyway, he was on that boat. That boat's about a hundred and fucking twelve years old now, plus. They had the Gypsy in there, and what they did was - they just shackled the hook to the anchor chain, and then let the chain run out so that the hook was halfway off the bottom. And then they just locked the Gypsy up. And they come along, and it just about pulled the cleat out, thrashing about with the hook. So, they’re blown away, and eventually it did, it broke the hook, and it swam away. We come in the next night, on this oily calm night, and sure enough - along comes another one. And so, the old hook with the Groper head comes out of the freezer. [both laugh] The buoy goes on it, and we waited a while. No, nothing. So, me and me mate, a Cousin of mine, his Brother was working with the Old Man, he was the Old Man’s nephew - his two Nephews. We were sitting on the transom of the [Mystial Ranger??] - a big wooden boat, a double-ender. We were sitting there having tea. "Holy fucking shit! The fucking Shark’s back!" They’re all inside pissing up, and playing cards. Next minute, it’s all hands on fucking deck, ready to hook the Shark up. "Fucking bastard. It didn’t take the fucking hook, swam away again." He said "Oh, it’s too close to the fucking boat." Yeah, so we're like "What's next?" [Nate??], this is his Nephew, a big Nephew that was working on the boat with him. He said "Fuck. I'll row that out." So, he jumps in the dinghy, and rows the fucking buoy about here to about those green bushes out there. Tows the hook out, and rows back in, and jumps back on the boat, and pulls the fucking dingy back in. So anyway, getting on dark. Sure enough, it come back with more intent and then Boom - on that fucking hook - got him. BANG. Up the [manney??], full gear on that one. Just whip him up through the gantries, not a fucking problem. So that Shark, when it went up in the air like that ... There was four sections of Seals. And they were all forward quarters, like clean bites. Four of them. But the most interesting part was, it had used Crayfish bait in it. The only guy that used flax to tie his bait into the pots - everyone else used to use string, hemp rope, with a big needle with an eye in it. You push your needle through the bait, push a string through the eye, and then pull it back like that, and then you tie it and put that into your pot. Well this guy, funnily enough, his nickname was Jimmy String, was using flax, because he was too mean to buy string. [both laugh] His gear was at Ruggedy. And he must have been up there doing a round, and just thrown his old bait back over the side. So, that Shark had come from Ruggedy, down there, before that bait was digested. 

CRAWFORD: Roughly, what’s that distance?

FISHER: Roughly 15 mile. I think it’s 10 mile there to Codfish - yeah, definitely wouldn’t be under 14. 

CRAWFORD: And that’s as the Crow flies. If the Shark's kicking around, going around Codfish ...

FISHER: Yeah. Well, how long does it take? What’s the digestion period of a lump, which would probably be about say a kilo and a half?

CRAWFORD: Yeah, yeah. 

FISHER: Conger Eel it was. Diced Conger Eel, section about that long. And it had the flax through it, and there’s only one boat that used flax, and his gear didn’t go past here - at that stage.

CRAWFORD: Do you ever remember hearing about or seeing White Pointers with their guts cut open, other than that? 

FISHER: No, nobody. They used to take the livers out of them. They were fair game for that.

CRAWFORD: Thank you for reminding me, because when you said that your Dad took the teeth out - remember the very first part of the interview?

FISHER: Yeah. We’d never keep the liver. 

CRAWFORD: You didn’t? There was no market or ...

FISHER: Not shiny enough to have him take any interest in it. Without interrupting what we were doing.

CRAWFORD: Right. If it had been another day, another, time another circumstance - maybe. 

FISHER: Yes. 

CRAWFORD: About Shark oil. Did you ever hear anything about when people are building a new Marae - the carvings, especially the carvings on the front - that there’s some type of fixative. You need oil? Fish oil, especially Shark oil’s? Something to treat the wood?

FISHER: Yeah. 

CRAWFORD: And that there’s Mana associated with that particular mix? 

FISHER: Alright. I didn’t know that.

CRAWFORD: I’ve heard stories that White Pointed liver oil is a particularly highly-esteemed oil used for that type of thing. I'm guessing that wasn’t discussed? 

FISHER: No. Nothing cultural. These guys weren’t cultural guys like that. They were still working the regions of their forefathers. The only cultural side was, really I seen shine out, was Titi harvesting. And the Tikanga from there.

CRAWFORD: The old ways?

FISHER: The behaviour and how they did things.

CRAWFORD: Remember when I used the word 'trophy' - I didn’t mean it in a base way.

FISHER: I don’t know anyone that’s ever, ever kept a full jaw for a trophy. There were plenty around that did it, but I don’t know. We were never that big on that sort of thing. 

CRAWFORD: Were there ever Māori stories about Taniwha with these Sharks? Any role of White Pointers in the stories that go way back? 

FISHER: No, I don’t know any old stories. 

CRAWFORD: Not the type of cultural stories that people on the water told each other? Or that would get told during the Muttonbirding season?

FISHER: You couldn’t tell these guys much, because they knew how these things behave. Being always an uncertain thing, and the power of these creatures that could have you over the barrel in a moment's notice on a 12-foot dinghy. The only good one is a dead one. 

CRAWFORD: Ok.

FISHER: We don’t think that way now, because we know a little bit more about them. Here we were at Ruggedy one night, back in the early-80s. Maybe around June. And we actually tied alongside Colin Topi. No, we actually had the anchor down, and he come in after us, only a short time later. And they had all this Groper they'd caught, about 60 or 70 Groper. We’d finished our day, and cleaned up, and were going to go ashore for a shot - which we did. So, me and my crew went rowed ashore in this little 10-foot tin dinghy. Just enough room for two. Don’t know where we were going to fit a deer if we shot any. But anyway, we were there till well after dark, after the sun went down. "Ah, we’ll just have a puff, and wander around the Sand Hills. It was a full moon. Wait till To washes down, and shuts his noisy engine down. So, we did that. After he shut it down, we rowed back out to the boat. This would be probably an hour after dark, after sunset. When we got aboard, To's crew, said to me, "Oh, you’ve got a hook haven't you?" And this is the old man’s hook I had. I said "Yeah." He said "Oh, should we set it?" And I couldn’t be bothered, you see. I said "Ah, fuck it." He said "I’ll set it up." Righto. 60-40. 60%-40%, you see? So, we made the deal. He fucked around, and set it up. Put a Groper head on it, because they had plenty of them - what they had left on deck. Threw the hook over the side, and what we did was the old story - couple of turns around the bit, had the 30 fathom of half-inch line. Part of the line ... the main coil was down by the bit, but we circled the rope up, not far from wheelhouse door, and tied a fucking bucket on it. Did To tell you that one? 

CRAWFORD: Not sure. Keep going.

FISHER: When the Shark started taking the line out, the bucket would start careering down the deck, and we’d know it was one on, because it was dark. So, we’re inside on the piss and playing cards. And To says "I'll go up and check the tea." He goes out there, because we're lashed up. He kicks the fucking bucket, and "Oh, Oh." Fucking jumping to attention. And he said "Ha, ha. I fucking gotcha, you pricks." [both laugh]. "Oh, yeah? Fuck you too. I hope your fucking tea's burnt." So anyway, he goes over and checks his tea, and just as he’s getting over the rail like that, and the fucking bucket took off! Well, of course the old Peter cries fucking wolf "You're not fucking getting away with that again!" [strained voice] "There's - fucking - one - on - it - this - time." "Get out here!” We all jump to attention, get down there, twig it up, lock him in. We had all the flood lights on at that stage - it was dark. What sort of piddly-ass lights we did have. So anyway, this fucking thing charged up and down, up and down. We tried to play it in. Actually, I didn’t have the Old Man’s crowbar, but we had a hook of our own - because it was lost. It was a new stainless steel half-inch hook, that’s what it was. I’ll change that part of the story. And it was alright playing him in, but at one stage it charged up ahead of the boats, and took a turn around the anchor chain. And when he took off again, we couldn’t play that line out at a pressure that wouldn’t bend the hook or break the line. To just sort of wear him down. He took off, and the turn along the anchor chain had locked the rope up, that it just stopped. And he just fucking straightened the hook out like that. So that one was gone. On saying that, here we are ... what we’ve always done is go ashore for a shot. You always had an evening shot. You always returned back to the boat in the dark. I don’t know how many times we’d been going in and out, in and out off these boats - from the shore to the boat in the dark, and never seen what’s been underneath you. And that proves it - that Shark never come anywhere near that dinghy when we were rowing out. And all the chum under the sun was underneath those two boats. There was 60 or 70 Groper. Guts, blood, and everything - because they come with a full load on, and they cleaned the lot at that anchorage. 

CRAWFORD: Right there. 

FISHER: Right there. Fresh. 

CRAWFORD: Lifetime, if you had to guess how many White Pointers you’ve seen in the wild, roughly?

FISHER: Well it’d be more than a dozen. 

CRAWFORD: Maybe twenty?

FISHER: Possibly. Maybe not. Yeah. 

CRAWFORD: In terms of Level 1s, Level 2s, Level 3s, Level 4s?

FISHER: Well, we’ve caught a lot of them. We’ve hooked them. We’ve set them up.

CRAWFORD: How many times did the Old Man's Groper head come out of the freezer? 

FISHER: Well, it wasn’t the same head - you’d change it

CRAWFORD: I know, I know, But, how many times did you and he actually use that strategy? 

FISHER: Three times. While I was there. 

CRAWFORD: How many times did you do it without him? 

FISHER: How many Sharks we caught? It was about four.

CRAWFORD: So that’s seven, right there. 

FISHER: Yeah. 

CRAWFORD: Those are in a completely different category because you baited them. Well, how many times did you see them first, and then get the hook in? 

FISHER: No, we didn’t see them first. We didn’t turn stuff up like Hainsey and them did. 

CRAWFORD: You had been out there fishing ...

FISHER: When we went into an anchorage with a load of Cod on and you were cleaning, there’s a natural ...

CRAWFORD: It’s going to attract them. 

FISHER: It’ll attract them. But a lot of boats do that out here, too. They clean as they’re working. So, they could pull Sharks around. 

CRAWFORD: Right, So, the White Pointers were attracted to that area when you were cleaning or doing something like that?

FISHER: We knew that. Yeah, yeah. So, we were ready when one turned up. 

CRAWFORD: Ok. You've got a total of seven that were baited, hooked, captured and killed. For all of the other White Pointers that you’ve seen ... at least one of them was at Mason's Bay, like ships passing, and you actually turned to follow it - so that’s a Level 1. For the Levels 2s, how many swim-bys, there and gone, do you reckon?

FISHER: There was that one at the back of the hill. There was one when we’re lifting a net out at Black Rock. There was one at Chalky - we were cleaning fish in there, just come up and sort of nuzzled us, the water running through the scuppers.

CRAWFORD: Now that’s a Level 3, that’s not just a swim-by, because it showed some direct interest. For just the swim-bys, roughly how many in total? 

FISHER: Maybe three.

CRAWFORD: And then the rest would be Levels 3s - roughly ten, if I’m doing my math right?

FISHER: Now by Level 3, you mean ...

CRAWFORD: Level 3 is some degree of interest. Circling, nuzzling, bumping, even mouthing - but without high intensity, like ramming or clamping and head-shaking. I think I asked you before, but have you seen any Level 4s?

FISHER: Is taking a hook a Level 4?

CRAWFORD: Not really. That’s in a completely different category. The White Pointer was originally just showing interest. It only turned into a Level 4 when you induced it, when they felt a hook going into their mouth. 

FISHER: No then, I haven’t. 

CRAWFORD: Any other notable direct encounters with a White Pointer?

FISHER: We were coming home one day from the northern side, we’d been fishing, Codfishing with the Old Man at Mason’s and that. We were heading home, and it was a real perfect day - where you can see stuff, getting around. It's not often you can see. If the Shark's around, it's got to be oily calm. We don’t get those conditions much, so you don’t know what’s there. But more often than not, if there's anything on the surface on an oily calm day - you’ll see it. Because I used to look for it. We were coming across here, and I said to this Māori mate of mine - he worked at the [freezer]works. I said "Oh, we’ll probably see a fucking White Pointer going across the Straits today, because it’s really fucking oily calm." He says "Oh, fucking bullshit." I said "Oh, you never know." So, we get up to about here ...

CRAWFORD: We're talking how far off the Bluff?

FISHER: Probably a mile. "Fuck - there’s one there!" The old story - the Old Man pulls out the gear, whips the freezer hatch open, and the hook with the Groper head comes out. [both laugh] He puts the buoy on the chain, heaves it over, 30 fathom of fucking half-inch fucking [donnaling??] line, two turns around the fucking bit. So, waiting, waiting. "Oh, here he is." It's coming along, coming up and he fucking stopped at the fucking hook. Virtually fucking stops! And then he just rolled way, and swam around a wee bit. By this time there was a heap of Mollymawks all around. And the behaviour of these birds told me something. And the Old Man, he said “That Shark’s not hungry.” Because the birds allowed him to swim amongst them, and one of them actually put his leg out and feathered himself off the Shark, and had that sort of like indignant look. [both laugh] "What the fuck do you think you’re doing?" And pushed himself off the Shark, as it went past. 

CRAWFORD: Did that White Pointer circle? Or did it come up with the bait, and then take off?

FISHER: When them birds went, the Old Man pulled the hook aboard and we just carried on home. 

CRAWFORD: The number of times that people have talked about the birds and these White Pointers - the Mollymawks in particular.

FISHER: Yeah. 

CRAWFORD: They’re cleaning fish off the back of their boat, and the birds are there, and then all of a sudden the birds will take off and they’ll just know that there's a White Pointer out there.

FISHER: Yeah, yeah. A hungry one. [laughs]

CRAWFORD: On several occasions you’ll get one of the guys talking about a White Pointer coming up and taking a Mollymawk. 

FISHER: Yeah. 

CRAWFORD: This is the first example I’ve ever heard, of the birds being so casual. What did they know, what had they seen, and why didn’t they take off? And that individual bird with that indignant look ...

FISHER: Just had that look. I’ve always remembered that. Won’t forget it. 

5. WHITE POINTER ENCOUNTERS - EXPERIENCES OF OTHERS

CRAWFORD: Let’s go to your Dad's experiences - and the other old-timers. What did they say about White Pointers in the southern region of the South Island, the Straits and Stewart island?

FISHER: Well, he loves talking about them. He can go on for hours about them. He started down in Pegasus, when he was about 14 or 15. They had the freezer up at the #North Arm, and he used to live there - they used to have a quite a big village there. He worked with [Jimmy Ryan??] on one of the boats. And he said there used to be Sharks around there all the time - you know, with the freezer and processing. And the boats coming in, and cleaning their fish. He said those big Sharks ... they were very hard to see, because of the brackish water. But they were always there. Them and Sevengillers. 

CRAWFORD: Back in the day, I've heard that people just called them 'Sharks.' They wouldn’t necessarily say 'White Pointers' or anything specific like that. But in this case, there was clearly a distinction between Sevengillers and White Pointers?

FISHER: Oh, yeah. There was a lot of Sevengillers. They were there without the factory - well, they had been.

CRAWFORD: But when they started up the fish factory ...

FISHER: It brought the bigger ones in. 

CRAWFORD: That was definitely your Dad's thinking? And people in the community? That there was an association between that factory and the processing fish ...

FISHER: Exactly. It brought the White Pointers in. I don’t know of anyone who has seen one over there. But there have been three or four boats in there, like cleaning Cod - come in from the Traps. I haven’t heard anyone mention they’ve seen a White Pointer coming in there in recent times. 

CRAWFORD: When did the processing plant shut down? Do you remember?

FISHER: Sometime in the '50s, I think. 

CRAWFORD: Roughly when you were born?

FISHER: Yeah, yeah. Would have been. Can't say for sure, but I think it was.

CRAWFORD: Did you ever see or hear about White Pointers that were particularly interested in boats as they were cleaning fish?

FISHER: Yeah, biting boats. You would have heard a few stories there, haven’t you?

CRAWFORD: Yes, I have.

FISHER: Yeah. There was one particular one. It was quite a hard easterly - that’s going way back. [Little Red Head??], the boat was anchored under here. And he was cleaning Cod. He'd been working hard along the shore here, keeping out of the wind as it was blowing over. On the leeward. He was cleaning Cod. The boat was called the [Capusa??] ...

CRAWFORD: Who was this?

FISHER: The boat’s name was the [Capusa??], and the guy was [Doug Henning??]. The guy was telling me that Doug, if he was alive today, would be around 110. He was laughing. He said "Oh, you know - Doug was anchored in there, and then this fucking Shark started shaking the boat around." And this boat's like fucking 38-40 feet long. Quite a heavy tempered little boat. Narrow as it is, but you know it’s substantial. And he got the fucking shits, fucking up the anchor, and punched an easterly back round home!

CRAWFORD: That White Pointer was shaking his boat while he was moored and cleaning? 

FISHER: Yeah. He was on the anchor, and underneath [Little Red Head??] in a patch with no wind. Because the wind was roaring over here. And he had a hell of a punch, the guy says it scared the shit out of him. And that boat’s way bigger than the Shark. So, I don’t know what the mentality was. "Oh, it’ll fucking go away sooner or later. Can’t bite a hole in the boat." But this guy was fucking terrified. And he would have seen heaps of Sharks prior to that. But this one really went at the boat. 

CRAWFORD: That’s a Level 4. 

FISHER: Yeah. 

CRAWFORD: Based on the entire region, anything that you’ve heard from the old-timers, your mates, anything that you might know personally, have been other Level 4 encounters with boats?

FISHER: Yeah. 

CRAWFORD: Have there ever been any Level 4s - where there have been attacks or near attacks on Humans, anyplace in this region?

FISHER: There was a Whale went into Waituna here once. It beached up in here. It was a big Sperm Whale. Blowing easterly. Easterly’s good for these shores. If the roll's down, you can anchor anywhere and go ashore. Waituna’s an anchorage you’d use in an easterly, so we were all in there. Everyone was setting nets for Greenbone for bait. All the juice of this Whale was pulling in White Pointers. But nobody actually seen one on that day. Somebody seen the Whale and "Oh, there's a big Whale at Waituna.” So, everyone sort of clued up early "We’re sick of lifting gear. We’ll go in early, go ashore and see the Whale." So, there's three or four boats - dinghies - went in, they set their nets, anchored up, went in, had a look at the Whale. And then there was one dinghy going out, and the Skipper was sitting on the transom, and the crew was rowing. They were getting halfway out, and [Tucker??] said "There’s a fucking White Pointer behind you there." Skipper said "Ha. You’re not fucking scaring me, you little shit.” Because [Tucker??] was quite young, you know? And cheeky. But the Skipper wasn’t going to look around, because he thought he was having him on. [Crockett??] says “Oh well. Don’t fucking believe me then. There it is again." And it got the better of him, he was going like this ... "Fuck!" Just about landed in [Crockett’s??] lap. But the Shark never attacked the dinghy. It just followed them out. 

CRAWFORD: That’s a combination of things. Because you’ve got a dead Whale beached. So, you’ve got all sorts of attraction there for White Pointers to be in the area. Then you‘ve got these dinghies. And you've got following behaviour. But it was more a Level 3 - interest and following. Not the Level 4 aggression, like taking a piece of the rudder or shaking the boat?

FISHER: Yeah. 

CRAWFORD: When was this? What year, do you remember?

FISHER: Oh shit, no. I was with the Old Man then. Would have been mid-70s.

CRAWFORD: Season? Time of year?

FISHER: Would have been about December. 

CRAWFORD: Where else might your Dad or the old-timers have seen aggregations of White Pointers?

FISHER: The Old Man ... there was a Whale floating around up here. 

CRAWFORD: Up in Te Waewae Bay?

FISHER: Yeah. No, sorry - Oreti. Out off here. They were trawling up there ...

CRAWFORD: What's the name of the island or the reef that you’re pointing to?

FISHER: Halfway Rocks. They got a call from a boat ... the [Janet??]. [Rolly Brunholl??], he was running it, and he came from Riverton. They fished out of there. The Old Man and them are trawling, and he called the Old Man up and he said "You want to come up over here."

CRAWFORD: To Halfway Rock?

FISHER: To Halfway Rock. There was a Whale floating around, and the Sharks were getting into it. So, they lifted up the gear. And it was only because of the way [Rolly??] said it. He said “I’m fucking out of here!” So, he took off home. And the Old Man and them went out, and I think he filmed about - must have been about 10 or 12 of them. 

CRAWFORD: White Pointers?

FISHER: Yeah. He took photos. He used to have a Super 8 sort of thing. And he took a bit of footage on it. The Sharks coming up, using their weight to ... He said you could hear the flesh, just the suction, and the Sharks just ripping the flesh off. And of course, he nosed the boat right up against the Whale - like that. As they’re coming up to take a bite, he was just whacking them in the back of the head with a .303. 

CRAWFORD: How many did he reckon there were around that carcass?

FISHER: Oh, it used to vary with how many drinks. Maybe between 20 and 30. 

CRAWFORD: Yeah. So, lots of them anyways, even on the low end. I think I've heard about this footage.

FISHER: Well, that got that loaned out, and it come back in a pretty sad state of repair. The guys just kept stopping it, and all the heat burnt through the film.

CRAWFORD: Ah, that’s too bad. I would have liked to see that.

========================================================

Effects of Cage Tour Dive Operations

CRAWFORD: Do you know from personal experience anything about the cage tour dive operations?  Have you been there? Have you seen them? 

FISHER: We went there one time. We were headed towards the [Southern] Muttonbird Island, with Muttonbird gear on. We seen Hainesy at Edwards, and "We should go down there and check it out. Give the boys and the builders a look." So we went in there and we had a yarn with Hainesy. I think he had about fourteen teenagers, girls I think they might have been. American girls. It was like a school party. And there was one lot just getting out, and there was one lot ready to get in. At that stage, I think he had about three Sharks swimming around. So, the people with me were not fishermen - they were sort of land people, and they were going to the island to build this house for us. And they got a good look at one or two of them, and took some photos, so it gave them a buzz. Fluff was there with his punters, bobbing around just off the afterquarter of Hainsey. Capitalizing for his punters. So Hainsey chums them in. Fluff turns up, gives his lot a look, and catches a Cod there as well - because they don’t seem to turn the Cod off, the White Pointers. So that’s a win-win situation for Fluff and for us. So, we're all happy, we went away south to do our thing. Hainsey carried on what he’s doing. I didn’t think the Sharks looked like they were doing anything that I hadn't seen before. Other than going for a hook, and they didn’t have that look. 

CRAWFORD: Well, you’ve seen your share of White Pointers. 

FISHER: Oh, yeah. For sure. 

CRAWFORD: In terms of that classification, the White Pointers at the cage operation, they were all Level 3s, in that interest mode. But no Level 4s? 

FISHER: Yeah, yeah. I would say that. They come in, and they were definitely having a look. But they would go away, as White Pointers do anyway. You see them for a bit, then they’ll disappear, and they'll come back fifteen minutes later, you know? They’ll be there again.

CRAWFORD: Based on your experience, did you ever notice that when they come back, they come in horizontally - or do they come up? Is there a pattern? 

FISHER: Well, they’re usually under the surface - just. 

CRAWFORD: And then coming in horizontal?

FISHER: Yep. A lot of water that we’ve caught them in - it’s either been dark, just into the dark part of the evening. Or it’s been in shallow water - so, they wouldn’t really get an upward direction.

CRAWFORD: You haven’t really been in a situation where they’ve had the opportunity to come up? At least that you could see?

FISHER: Not really. they don’t. They didn’t ever break water, as a sea colossus, you know. Maybe going for a baby Seal or whatever. I’ve never seen anything like that. 

CRAWFORD: So, what you saw with Mike Haines, those animals were Level 3?

FISHER: They were just milling around. Yeah. 

CRAWFORD: What we’re going to do now is ... I’m going to ask you a series of questions, based on the terms of the current two-year DOC permit. They head out from Bluff, last year Peter was sometimes sailing out of Halfmoon Bay. They go over to Edwards island - and it can only be Edwards Island, the permit says. And they can only be a certain distance from the island. They anchor. They berley, and when they berley it has to be a relatively fine mince. And the thinking that I’ve been told by the operators is that DOC doesn’t want them actually feeding the Sharks. 

FISHER: Yeah, that's fine. If they can get around without doing it, that’s fine. 

CRAWFORD: For quite some time they've used Tuna. Which the White Pointers respond to. They’ve got the cage in the water. And if they berley up a White Pointer, the clients go in the cage, they get their experience and their pictures. They do have a throw bait - the head of a Tuna on a line, and they’ll throw that out to try and bring the Sharks in closer, so that the people in the cage can see them. That goes on for the day. They’ll get maybe different animals, coming over the course of the day. And then at the end of the day, they turn off the berley, lift the cage, go home. 

FISHER: So where does that leave the Shark?

CRAWFORD: Do you think that that activity as described, has an important, lasting effect on the Sharks?

FISHER: Well, it would have an effect until such time as he’s not hungry. Because obviously they've made him hungry, or thinking about it. What stage of the process is he in before he eats? What does he have to do after that to go and satisfy that carrot - or that enticement?

CRAWFORD: That’s an important point.

FISHER: It’s like trying to go past a fucking pie shop, isn’t it? 

CRAWFORD: With regards to your story about heading back and seeing that White Pointer close to Bluff. Out goes the old Groper head on a hook - and that animal was just not interested. 

FISHER: No. The Old Man knew that from the birds. He said straight away, "I'm not fucking around here. The birds are not scared." 

CRAWFORD: I think you’re the first person to point this out this way - when I ask that question “Do Shark cage tour dive operation have an important, lasting effect on the animals?”  And you say, it depends on the state of mind of the animal when it got there?

FISHER: Exactly. 

CRAWFORD: To what extent was it already hungry when it arrived?

FISHER: They leave in the late afternoon and in the evening. We’ve always had a bit of strike on the hooks. They don’t investigate for a while, disappear for like fifteen or twenty, and then turn up again and check the hook out again. And then they’ll go away again. They know it’s there - but they weren’t there specifically for that bait. They come back later, and it’s still there. So, they probably know when they go and have another look around - it’s going to be there again when they go back. So, they’ve got in their mind that they’re going to go hit it. And it’s usually on evening. 

CRAWFORD: When you say 'on evening' you mean dusk? 

FISHER: Yes. Just before the sun drops. Or any time after that. Because the fact is, these guys up their anchor - about when? 

CRAWFORD: Four o’clock.

FISHER: Four o’clock? Whip some enticing smells around the place ... So, everything's running around with their guts rumbling - supposedly. Unless he’s just had a Seal or two. But he’s got a situation that needs to be satisfied. Till that satisfactions dealt to, that Shark must be in a state of ... must be getting nearer to a Level 4. That they don’t see.

CRAWFORD: You’re also the first person who brought that up as well, the time of day that they leave Edwards Island. Several people have talked about that kind of day-night cycle in White Pointer behaviour. Just yesterday, one of the cage operators talked about how you’ve got to get there as close as possible to dawn - because that’s when the animals are most active. And then during the middle of the day ...

FISHER: They’re lazy. Yeah.

CRAWFORD: But based on what you’re saying, the opposite is true at the other end of the day.

FISHER: That’s right. 

CRAWFORD: And this has been a big theme with the swimming community and the boarding community. If you are in a place where Sharks can be around or have been seen, you do not surf early in the morning or late at night. 

FISHER: No, no. 

CRAWFORD: Ok. So, getting back to the original question, when I said important and lasting effect ...

FISHER: Until it’s hungry again. And if it's hungry, and this enticement turns up again the next day, it would go through that pattern again. I’m saying it's not lasting - it’d be more like ...

CRAWFORD: It’s lasting for as long as the animal’s hungry? Until it feeds again?

FISHER: They’re leaving just before evening. 

CRAWFORD: I know, but the point is - until the Shark feeds again. And then you reckon the effect would pretty much dissipate? So, it's a short-term effect - is that what you’re thinking?

FISHER: I can’t see the animal going through a rapid evolution to change its behaviour overnight. It’ll take something when it’s ready. But do they really add up? Who’s going to be in the water at four o’clock in the fuckin afternoon anyway? [laughs] 

CRAWFORD: Ok. But this has to do as much with proximity - because that’s at Edwards Island. 

FISHER: Yeah, ok. It’s a Pāua patch. 

CRAWFORD: It is. It’s not necessarily in Halfmoon Bay or Horseshoe Bay. 

FISHER: Yes. 

CRAWFORD: And there are Pāua divers who feel they have a legitimate right to be Pāua fishing the Titi Islands, as they had before the cage tour dive operations. 

FISHER: Yes. 

CRAWFORD: Even if it’s over at Jacky Lee, or over at Womens Island or North Island ... It’s not that far as the Nazgûl flies, or as the White Pointer swims, into Paterson Inlet either. Cruising speed for a White Pointer ... what would you figure it might be comfortable doing for a long period of time? Based on the White Pointers you've seen?

FISHER: Look, I wouldn’t know. 

CRAWFORD: What would you guess though? 

FISHER: Actually, the one that we seen at Mason’s, I was telling you about in June? We were heading in and it was heading out. I just had a look out the window and "Whoa. Jeez.” So, we whipped around ...

CRAWFORD: That was a Level 1 - just an observation. It didn’t approach you. You were just passing in opposite directions?

FISHER: Yeah. Well, he was just going along minding his own business. We just happened to be going in, and there’s one heading out. We turned around and followed it, and he was just below the surface.

CRAWFORD: Roughly what speed?

FISHER: Oh, I reckon five.

CRAWFORD: Five knots? 

FISHER: Yeah. 

CRAWFORD: Ok. Let's imagine five knots. How long would it take a White Pointer, if it swam fairly straight at five knots, to get from Edwards Island over towards Halfmoon Bay? How long of a swim would that be?

FISHER: Could do it within an hour. Quite comfortably. 

CRAWFORD: So, it’s a fairly short period of time. It’s a fairly short distance. 

FISHER: It is. It's irrelevant to a Shark. I mean "I think I’ll go over there." Well, he’d be there in no time. 

CRAWFORD: The point I’m trying to get at is ... you brought up the importance of how long. If there’s a change in the animal's behaviour, if the berleying made it hungry, and there was no satisfaction because the operators aren’t allowed to feed, and it was still hungry until it feeds?

FISHER: Well, the thing is - was it naturally hungry in the first place? 

CRAWFORD: You could reckon that if the Shark follows a berley trail, it might well be because it’s hungry. Or it might be just because that’s the way they're built - that even if it wasn’t hungry, it would still follow the berly. 

FISHER: It’ll stay on it till it is hungry. That's one thing, like these Whale carcasses ... they go. And once the Sharks mark that off, when they’re ready to feed, they go and have a muncha. Then they back off. When they’re ready, they go back in again, they have another one. Until such time as all the good bits are gone. And they’ve lost interest. They move on.

CRAWFORD: These White Pointers are not silly. They likely know where they are in the environment, if there is something that is giving off some type of signal for food - like a Whale carcass - they’ll likely keep track of it, if it’s possible. 

FISHER: But there’s something at the end of that. The thing is with the cage - there’s nothing. And if that Shark swims around, and he’s getting hungrier, because he’s burning up more energy, and doesn’t get satisfied within that feeding mechanism that they have. And if he’s slightly over that level, slightly hungrier than hungry. Maybe that could affect them “Ah, fuck it. I’ll take a bite off this thing. This'll do. I'm sick of swimming around.” It could be a malnutrition thing going on. That's right. 

CRAWFORD: But at Edwards Island ... when I was doing the observations, and I was looking over at the Seals. I mean - dinner’s right there on the shore. 

FISHER: Yeah, yeah. 

CRAWFORD: So, it’s not as if there’s no food around. 

FISHER: No, no. 

CRAWFORD: Ok. Let's introduce some complexity, step by step. First, do you think that a Shark that has been exposed to cage tour dive operations as we’ve described - are they likely to associate the smell of food with the location? In this case Edwards Island. Such that they would hang around Edwards Island more, even if there was no berley?

FISHER: No. They've got to eat. 

CRAWFORD: Your opinion is they’re going to follow the berley trail, they’re going to respond to the berley, but they’re not going to associate that with the place? 

FISHER: I wouldn’t think so. Because at the end of the day, when it all goes away, there’s nothing there for them.

CRAWFORD: Because the berley trail is going to disappear. 

FISHER: Well, it brings them in, and there’s nothing there. 

CRAWFORD: So, you wouldn’t figure that there would be more White Pointers hanging around Edwards Island now - as a result of eight years of cage tour dive operation. More than there would be otherwise?

FISHER: Nah.

CRAWFORD: Ok. Next part. Do you reckon that a White Pointer that’s exposed to the cage tour dive operations would associate the smell of food with a boat - not any boat in particular, just a floating boat. Such that if it’s someplace else at some other time, and it sees another boat - it would be more likely to investigate that boat? 

FISHER: Well, I've seen White Pointers without that. Like I said, we just happen to see one going the other way, when we were going the other way, and were able to turn around and follow it.

CRAWFORD: You are a fisherman, so you're almost always going to be doing something that might have an interesting smell or whatever. Have you ever had White Pointers come up to your boat, when you weren’t fishing, and investigate?

FISHER: Not nuzzle the scuppers, no.

CRAWFORD: Do you think it’s likely the cage tour dive operations would increase the frequency or the intensity of White Pointers checking out a sailboat, or checking out a pleasure boat of people who have nothing to do with the fishery?

FISHER: No, no. They’re not stupid. See, I think a White Pointer is built to conserve energy. And I think the berley does bring them in, because there’s a definite sign of something at the end. But they get there, and there’s nothing there.

CRAWFORD: But you don’t think that the translation is going to go over to boats in general?

FISHER: A boat's here, a boat's there - it's going to come over and have look? No, not particularly.

CRAWFORD: Ok. Now I'm going to add the next bit, which is the specific configuration of the cage tour boats - Peter’s boat and Michael’s boat ...

FISHER: Oh, hell - I wouldn't know. Would they know the shapes?

CRAWFORD: Shapes, colours, sounds of the motors?

FISHER: I know Porpoises do. They lock that in.

CRAWFORD: Do you think that a White Pointer that’s been exposed to the Shark cage tour dive operations, would associate with that specific boat? If they sensed that boat someplace else - "I know this boat. I’m checking it out for food."

FISHER: It’s going to sound bad for Peter and Hainesy, because if these Sharks are really bright, and they hear that boat that’s only producing the smell of a good meal, and at the end of the day it’s nothing ... "I might as well bugger off over there, and grab a Seal." Maybe they’re getting that reaction now - I don’t know. Maybe they’re getting on to it, because they’re not allowed to feed them anymore. I think they were giving a little bit more than they have been. And now these Sharks are probably seeing it like “Well there’s nothing there anyway. What's the point?” What are these cage guys going to do when that happens - if that happens? If the Sharks start losing interest because there’s nothing there? There’ll be new Sharks turn up, that don’t know.

CRAWFORD: Yes. And there still might be some residents, one way or another. That’s why I was focusing on residency. And they’re also going to get some new ones arriving that are naive.

FISHER: Only Pete and them will be able to tell us that, because they’ll know the regularity of these Sharks. 

CRAWFORD: Exactly. Here’s another thing. Are you aware of people that are coming over from Bluff, and specifically heading out to the northern Titi Islands, like Edwards and Jacky Lee - specifically for a nature moment with the White Pointers? 

FISHER: There’s been a few. 

CRAWFORD: Yes. I've been hearing that it’s increasing.

FISHER: Yep. 

CRAWFORD: And word has it that these Humans aren’t silly either. They know if they take a box of Cod frames, the White Pointers will show up for sure. 

FISHER: Yeah, sure. Well, we thought of doing it ourselves. And that’s not to mention the likes of Squizzy and the other boats out there that are doing their handline charters. And the commercial boats that Cod there. 

CRAWFORD: All of them. The point that I'm trying to get to, is that when DOC set the permit and said "Thou shalt berley and thou shalt use throwbait, but Thou shalt not feed." But that permit does not stop any other people from feeding them. 

FISHER: No. 

CRAWFORD: And if it’s the case that food in the mouth causes the association to be very, very strong - then it could be as much day-trippers that are feeding the White Pointers and creating that association. Not necessarily the berley from the cage operations. 

FISHER: But they’ll satisfy the Shark to a certain degree. Like Joe Cave’s two White Pointers that were hoisted up at the wharf - what did they drop?

CRAWFORD: Cod frames.

FISHER: Cod frames. They were satisfied. 

CRAWFORD: They were satisfied.

FISHER: They swam around that wharf and along those beaches. And they didn’t take anyone. 

CRAWFORD: Well there’s a couple of things here. But one very important thing is - some people have expressed a great deal of concern that it’s the lack of feeding that increases the frustration in these White Pointers. 

FISHER: That’s what I wanted to get to. 

CRAWFORD: And the frustration could push a Level 3 into a Level 4. Clamp down, start throwing its weight around or something like that. Making them mad. 

FISHER: Yeah, yeah, yeah. 

CRAWFORD: On the other hand, you’ve got this situation where if you do actually feed them, you may be locking in that association with Humans in a much, much stronger way. And that’s one of the things which is a big unknown in this - is the smell of food only enough of a reward for that kind of conditioned behaviour? Or does it require actually getting the food in its mouth? We don’t know. 

FISHER: I would say it would agitate them. It would agitate the fuck out of me. If you’re hungry, and you’re going down the fish shop and they close the door just as you get there, and put a closed sign on the door just as soon as you’re getting close ... [laughs] What are you going to do?

CRAWFORD: Ok. Here’s the last part. Do you think that a White Pointer that’s been exposed to cage tour dive operations is likely to associate the smell of food with the occurrence of Humans in the water - such that if, at another place, another time, they see a Human in the water, that they would be more likely to investigate? 

FISHER: They could investigate. Whether they bite or not, I don’t know. 

CRAWFORD: Investigate. Potentially like a Level 1 becoming a Level 2, and if it was already a Level 2 to Level 3, or Level 3 to Level 4. That kind of thing. Do you think that association would translate over to increased risk for other Humans in the water elsewhere?

FISHER: So, what you’re saying is that the berley that Hainsey’s grinding up and in his mincer, he puts people in the cage, the Shark associates that smell with who’s is in cage ...

CRAWFORD: Not who specifically, but maybe Humans generally.

FISHER: Well, Humans. Yeah. 

CRAWFORD: The original question ... Do you think that Sharks that are exposed to the cage tour dive operations, would associate the smell of food that they get at the cage tour dive operations with the presence of Humans - to the point that if they saw a Human in the water someplace else, they would be more likely to investigate and/or at a higher level? And I’m specifically saying - outside of the waters where there is berley. Elsewhere, like Oreti Beach, or Porridge or the Catlins. Somewhere like that.

FISHER: Oh, ok. So, there’s no berley, there’s just Humans? But the Sharks have been at the berley station, the cage dive operations, yesterday or the day before?

CRAWFORD: Yes. Or the week before, or even potentially the year before. But for right now let’s keep it short. Let’s say a couple of days.

FISHER: I don’t know. I couldn’t answer that.

CRAWFORD: That’s ok. We'll leave it at that. You can say "I don’t know" anywhere along the line. Other people have. 

FISHER: Yeah. The seven years that they’ve been doing that, and these Sharks have been swimming around non-stop, other than a few months, round all these places. You talk about Porridge and all that. That in in itself answers that question. Who’s been bitten?

CRAWFORD: Ok. That's part of it at the higher level of interaction.  But also, who has been investigated by these Sharks?

FISHER: Ah, investigated. 

CRAWFORD: Some of the Islanders are saying that these White Pointers are getting much more nosy. 

FISHER: Ah, ok. Well that doesn’t sound good. They’re doing it for a reason. 

CRAWFORD: But you're right - there haven’t been any hits in this region. But what some of the Islanders are saying, is the frequency and intensity of investigative behaviour and Level 3 behaviour is increasing. 

FISHER: Well they know, they know. You know, we don’t see White Pointers in Bluff. Like Squizzy’s running in and out in his boat all the time - like those little dinghies? [chuckles] Like I said, we’ve been Deer hunting for years, and we row ashore and go back, and then you catch a White Pointer soon as you get back. It’s been under you all the time. And it was chummed up. 

Copyright © 2019 Vaughn Fisher and Steve Crawford