National News & Information > Features May 2008

At the end are the rainbows by Hugh Creasy

I love the smell of macrocarpa in the morning. There’s a stack of it behind my garage, recently sawn and split and drying nicely. It smells resiny and satisfying. It’s an insurance policy against a cold winter and rising power prices. It’s a testament to my willingness to provide a warm home through physical effort, and I look forward to using it.

All creatures have survival and protective instincts, but their strength varies enormously between species. There’s a pair of magpies on a nearby field  that nested in spring. For months the parents have been besieged by demanding youngsters that cawed and begged in noisy displays that went on throughout the daylight hours of summer.

One of the youngsters lost the use of  both its legs and sat under some pine trees for weeks, calling for food which its dutiful parents provided. Their devotion was outstanding, though the odds of the youngster surviving were nil, and one day in midsummer it disappeared, no doubt a meal for a stoat or a cat.

Now the time has come for the family’s separation. I can no longer tell the youngsters from their parents. They are all the same size and colouring, but there are displays of aggression between them all and soon some will leave to found new territories.
The paradise shelducks on the same paddock have a different family structure. For some months, now, the juveniles have  gathered in their own flock along with youngsters from other adult pairs. The adults remain paired on the open grass, but the juveniles flock along a streambed and seem to enjoy the cover of long grass and thick shrubbery.

As adults their chances of survival are probably less than 20%. There are too many of them to comfortably compete for available food and they will be driven away  by older birds. They will seek company and hunters with callers and decoys will draw them with a fatal attraction. A paradise shelduck more than a season old is not a great table bird, but these youngsters, well fed and tender can grace any table.

Give thanks for good parenting. 

In the stream there are trout, just small, but with a massive drive for sex and survival. It has always been in June that sea-run fish from the estuary have arrived in the pool under the bridge. They are huge brutes, compared to the resident fish, and lord it over their smaller cousins, chasing them from the pools into fast water where their ability to survive is greatly lessened.

There is limited spawning gravel and the redds will be disturbed time and time again as more fish arrive from the sea. The smaller, resident fish, banished to the riffles and runs , will enjoy a feast as eggs are dislodged and drift downstream. 

I sometimes regret that these big sea-run fish cannot be caught because the stream is closed for spawning. They are fat and careless, and there are more than enough of them to keep the generations ticking over.

In a boggy meadow alongside the stream an extended family of pukeko rule.  They are aggressive to their neighbours – too aggressive for the mallard pair that tried to nest nearby. It took only a few days of screeching, wing-flapping and chasing to deter the mallards from setting up home.

Pukekos may have a comical walk and their black chicks are cute as can be, but behind that likeable appearance lies a heart of steel. They are efficient killers and staunch defenders of their nests and chicks.

Now that opening weekend of the game season has passed, and the seekers of bag limits have had their fill, there is time for the more contemplative hunter to pursue gamebirds. An evening or two on a pond or a day hunting the forests for pheasants can be as rewarding as a limit bag, and success can be measured by a single bird brought down by skill and persistence. 

As the weather gets colder it requires considerable intestinal fortitude for the hunter to get out of bed in the knowledge that his dawn arrival at the pond will result in only one or two birds, and he will respect and value that bird much more than he did in the opening weekend bomb-up. 

Anglers find this time of year most rewarding, but they must prepare for discomfort. The water is cold, waders make movement clumsy and rivers can run dangerously high. But the fish are in fine condition, fat and ready for breeding. They take fly or spinner with savage intensity, eager to gain strength and compete for their place in the river.
For winter fishing I like to use a heavier rod than my 5-weight for summer. In the Wellington district there are plenty of rivers still open, and faster, deeper water means longer and stronger leaders and weighted nymphs or bushy wet flies after dark.
And when the fishing’s done, or I’ve fired a shot or two over a pond, there is the welcoming stink of woodsmoke and the heat of macrocarpa sparking in the wood-burner.  All that and a shot of grappa before bedtime.

It’s all a matter getting out of it what you put into it

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