A Ngai Tahu project to rejuvenate the longfin eel population in the Waitaki catchment is to get support from the Ohau Conservation Trust at its annual fund-raising dinner on May 3.
The trust will contribute proceeds from the event to the Waitaki Native Fish Committee's efforts to aid the longfin eel in the Waitaki River and lakes system.
Trustee Eileen McMillan said the first hydro dam on the Waitaki River at Kurow in 1935 stopped the migration of fish to breed at sea, including the longfin eels (Anguilla dieffenbachii).
Members of the committee, supported by Meridian Energy and others, caught mature female longfin eels above the Waitaki dams and transferred them downstream so they could migrate to sea and spawn in the Tonga Trench, 6000km away.
Some females could be more than 100 years old.
The tiny returning elvers, whose passage upriver was blocked by the Waitaki Dam, were caught and transferred to Lake Benmore.
A video on the eel will be viewed at the dinner and John Wilkie, of the native fish committee, will show a documentary film, Dancing Salmon Home, which demonstrates how native Americans are reintroducing the descendants of their own salmon, from New Zealand, to California.
