WHAT IS A WHITEBAIT?

Hokitika Guardian, 28 February 1928, Page 1

WHAT IS A WHITEBAIT?

It is not so many years ago since the Law Courts in the Old Country were troubled by the knotty problem:

“What is a sardine?” Its natural successor in New Zealand is raised by a correspondent from Wlmrepapa, who inquires whether whitebait are caught in rivers only. “ I believe,” he says, “they are caught in the sea also, and, if memory serves me right, they are often caught at Northcote.” The plot thickened when one of two North Shore residents assured M.A.T. of the Auckland Star, that whitebaiit were caught in the Waitemata. “They look like whitebait and they taste like whitebait. anyway,” an old time Devonportoninn said, leaving only one question to he decided, namely, whether the little lisli behaved like whitebait. Evidently they do not, for a naturalist of standing was definite in his decision that the true whitebait is not found in the sea. but in rivers and estuaries only. Here is bis answer: True whitebait is tbe young of the inanga, or native minnow, which is about lour inches long. The young ascend the rivers in shoals in spring and are only one or two inches long. Ihe small fish caught in the sea are sprats or sardines. They live in shoals in tbe open sea. These sea forms may ho the voting el other merino hsh.