Fish

Fish

Latest news

Tangaroa heads back to sea – with social distancing

13 May 2020

NIWA’s flagship research vessel Tangaroa will sail out of Wellington Harbour on Sunday for the first scientific voyage since the lockdown.

The King of the Fish

Feature story

29 April 2020

Before fish Alvin Setiawan studied weta and penguins. These days he’s never far from the kingfish tanks at NIWA’s Northland Marine Research Centre at Bream Bay.

Extremely rare albino shark discovered in Auckland

Media Release

22 April 2020

A deep dive into the collection of an Auckland War Memorial Museum has revealed an extremely rare albino shark.

Giant squid and glow-in-the-dark sharks surprise scientists

Media Release

17 February 2020

A giant squid and several glow-in-the-dark sharks were surprise finds for NIWA scientists last month on the Chatham Rise during a voyage to survey hoki, New Zealand’s most valuable commercial fish species.

Our work

Cultural Keystone Species - co-management and restoration of our freshwater taonga species

Māori communities around the country note that the abundance, size and/or distribution of tuna, kōura and kāeo/kākahi is declining and that current populations aren’t sufficient to meet their needs.

Historical changes in juvenile fish habitats

NIWA is looking for people who have had a long association with the Hauraki Gulf or Marlborough Sounds to help them with a research project on juvenile fish habitats.

New Zealand fish passage guidelines

The New Zealand Fish Passage Guidelines sets out recommended practice for the design of instream infrastructure to provide for fish passage.

Improving Tonga’s deepwater demersal line fishery

NIWA is in its third year of a 5-year phased project on the deepwater line fishery in Tonga funded by the NZ Aid Programme’s Partnership for International Development Fund. The aim of the project is to deliver the improved governance, management, and economic and biological sustainability of the fishery focusing on deepwater snapper and bluenose in the Tonga EEZ.

Latest videos

The world's most mysterious fish

A video about The world's most mysterious fish. NIWA researchers are working with iwi to try to unlock the secrets of New Zealand tuna—freshwater eels. Every year tiny, glass eels wash in on the tide at river mouths along our coast. But where do they come from and how do they get there?

Science on the high seas

Sustainable fisheries depend on good scientific data about fish stocks. NIWA scientists head out into Cook Strait on Research Vessel Kaharoa to survey the hoki fishery and advise officials on catch rates.

Freshwater fish swim their all for science

The tiny inanga have been plucked from Waikato streams and held in a darkened laboratory for the last month, undertaking highly advanced testing to find the strongest, fittest and fastest fish.

Ocean acidification—what is it?

The on-going rise of carbon dioxide (CO₂) in the atmosphere is not only changing our climate—it is also changing our oceans. Take a look at the work of the NIWA-led CARIM project into what these changes may mean for the delicate balance of marine life.

Issue 27, 2008

Epic Antarctic voyage complete: analysis begins

Applying the science: didymo

Major port biosecurity surveillance underway

What risk from alien fish?

Yellowtail kingfish

NIWA is at the forefront of kingfish aquaculture research and is readying for commercial production to capitalise on this potentially lucrative market.

First fossils of extinct native fish identified

22 November 2005

Two fossils discovered in the Ormond Valley, near Gisborne, have been identified as a mysterious extinct native fish, the grayling or upokororo. They represent the first known fossils of New Zealand grayling.

Scientists carry out Biosecurity NZ survey for clubbed tunicate (Sea Squirt)

13 October 2005

Scientists from NIWA are diving in Waitemata Harbour to establish precisely how far an invasive sea squirt, known as the clubbed tunicate (or Styela clava), has spread.

What lives in that stream?

6 September 2004

Scientific records of at least 104,000 samples of New Zealand’s freshwater fish, invertebrates, algae and other aquatic plants are now available at the click of a mouse.

Chemical prints finger fish

20 May 2003

A technique that collects chemical ‘fingerprints’ from the ear bones of fish to help scientists identify which estuaries they originated from could have important implications for the management of New Zealand’s local fisheries, said an article in the latest issue of Fisheries & Aquaculture Update, published by NIWA’s National Centre for Fisheries and Aquaculture.

Fishers' help sought for tagging programme

30 April 2002

If you hook yourself a tagged blue cod, NIWA would like to hear from you.

Keeping tabs on our native eels

4 July 2001

New tags that are attached by a tough nylon thread could finally solve the mystery of where New Zealand‘s freshwater eels spawn.

Dinosaur technology keeps track of fish

27 March 2001

The same technique used to create the frighteningly life-like dinosaurs in the BBC documentary 'Walking with Dinosaurs' is now being used to help monitor New Zealand’s fish populations.

No smolt release or catch in local rivers by Glenariffe Salmon Farm

29 April 1999

An agreement in principle has been reached for the sale of the Glenariffe Salmon Hatchery currently owned by NIWA, to Rakaia Salmon Limited. The new company wishes to raise salmon for the market by using the hatchery raceways. Initial concerns by environmental groups over potential capture of young salmon for the farm from the Rakaia River will not be an issue.

Numbers of fish increase in Kapiti Marine Reserve

3 March 1999

The abundance and sizes of fish within the Kapiti Marine Reserve have impressed research divers who have just completed a survey to assess how well the marine environment has recovered since it was protected in 1992.

French-NZ science collaboration covers eels, albatrosses and submarine landslides

26 February 1999

French researchers are now, or soon to be, closely involved in a range of New Zealand environmental and marine studies taking in such diverse activities as migratory problems of fish including eels, the foraging habits of royal albatross in southern oceans, and the potential tsunami impact of undersea landslides.

Crayfish to enter the computer age

2 December 1998

Crayfish living along the Abel Tasman National Park coastline will be introduced to the silicon chip age later this month.

Fish kills off Kaikoura linked to toxic algae

2 March 1998

New findings by scientists at the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) have revealed that the death of kina, starfish, and possibly other fishes, in late January and early February off the Kaikoura coast appears to be linked to toxic algae.

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