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Tuesday, March 12, 2019

Not for the faint hearted!


One of our camp activities for 2019 was to go eeling!  We were all very excited - some had done it before and others hadn't!  It didn't matter which group you were in eeling is exciting!  You have to go late at night, set the traps and then check them early in the morning.  Eels can't see very well but can sense light so when it is dusk they come out!  Well when we first arrived there was a huge one in the river!  Wow excitement ripples through all of us!  


We set 2 types of traps - hinaki we had mad ourselves out of wire and a fyke net which was lent to us by Mr Farmer.  This one as you will see caught the most eels!  We were astounded to see over 25 eels in there in the morning!  Some had blue eyes which means that they are on their way to Tonga to breed so Jed (our parent expert) let those ones go to keep the species alive!  We kept 7 eels for our learning and put the rest back. 


Today, March 12, we dissected the eels.  It was very smelly and we had to be very self disciplined because the equipment is very sharp.  We learnt a lot about dissection, anatomy and cultural practices.  

The rules were: 
  • Be respectful of the animal - no sillyness and trying to scare others. 
  • Be responsible with the equipment - it can harm you. 
  • Wear safety gear. 
  • Take turns. 
The anatomy we looked for was: 
  • The 2 types of fins. 
  • Eyes
  • Mouth
  • Ears
  • Vent
  • Heart
  • Gills
  • Guts
  • Liver - gall bladder
  • Brain
Culturally we: 
  • Learnt about their habitat and why eels are special creatures to NZ
  • Blessed the life we were using to learn from with Karakia
  • Buried the remains to give back to the Earth
  • Hung them in a tree to deslime. 
  • Learnt how to catch them traditionally with hinaki. 
Big thank you to Rachel, Miss McIntosh, Matua James and Jed for teaching us and helping us with this learning. 

Nā tō rourou, nā taku rourou
ka ora ai te iwi

With your food basket and my food basket the people will thrive