TOHEROA BAN WON’T AFFECT OHOPE BEACH

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 15, Issue 45, 17 May 1950, Page 5

TOHEROA BAN WON’T AFFECT OHOPE BEACH

Although other parts of New Zealand are going to .be affected by the closing of the toheroa beds on the Ninety Mile and Muriwai Beaches Ohope and Whakatane people should not be worried unduly as they still have their source of supply—Ohope Beach—open to them. However, toheroa hunters should be warned to keep within the limit number for each person. The supply is not unlimited.

For other areas it looks as if toheroa soup will be off the menu for a long time yet. More than two years ago the Marine Department, in order to allow the toheroa beds to become rejuvenated, closed down the taking of toheroas for commercial purposes at the Ninety Mile Beach and Muriwai Beach, two of the famous toheroa grounds.

Latest reports on the condition of the beds there are not the most encouraging. Muriwai is showing some improvement as the result of being left alone, but Ninety Mile Beach has shown little change over the last five years. The ban still operates. There is consequently no commercial packing, except for a small company which packs a limited quantity from its own little beach north of Auckland.

The expension of transport facL lities and the bigger petrol allowance have brought the toheroas within reach of more and more individual fanciers, and anyone may still take toheroas (in a strictly limited quantity) in season providing one doesn’t go poking around in the beds with an iron or steel implement. It seems that toheroas can become a little temperamental. If they do become annoyed they are liable to crawl out of their beds and migrate elsewhere, and there is a theory that the heavy wartime traffic in the Ninety Mile Beach area might have made the local toheroas a little peeved.j