NEW ZEALAND EELS.

Manawatu Herald, Volume L, Issue 3898, 24 January 1929, Page 1

NEW ZEALAND EELS.

COMMERCIAL VALUE NOT APPRECIATED.

The opinion that the commercial importance of the New Zealand eels was not sufficiently appreciated nowadays was expressed by Dr. Johannes Schmidt, of the Dana, in a lecture from 2YA on Thursday evening. “In my country,” said Dr. Schmidt, “the eel has a high commercial value and is much esteemed as a food. It is prepared for the table in several different ways. We use it for soup; it is eaten fried, boiled, smoked, marinated, and also in jelly. Recent researches have proved it to be particularly rich in vitamins —which .affords modern confirmation of the value attached to this fish as food by your own ancestors and more especially by the Maoris, to whom, indeed, it (afforded the chief source of fle»h food in the inland districts. “I have been most interested to see here yesterday a very skilful and successful exhibition of the capture of eels by Maoris according to their old-time method by gaffing them.

“The pa tuna —the great trap, which was formerly used by the Maoris —is, I find, nearly the same in the details of its construction and the principle of fishing as the most effective form of gear used for catching eels in the great Commercial eel fisheries of Europe. This is unmistakable proof of the great ingenuity of the Maori race 1”