Farmers in Waitaki have been asked to part with old car and truck batteries to help the Waitaki Riparian Enhancement Society maintain its salmon fishery programme.
The society will hold a battery drive tomorrow, and secretary-treasurer Linn Koevoet hoped to raise between $4000 and $6000 to help feed the salmon smolt at the volunteer-run hatchery at Welcome Stream.
"It depends on how many people we get. If we get a big turnout we will get a lot of money. If we get a poor turnout we won't raise that much money. It all depends on the turnout.
"If we can get 30 vehicles for this battery drive, we will have a very good collection.""We believe we can get $600 a tonne of batteries, and a tonne of batteries is not that much; truck batteries make up a tonne very quickly."
He said volunteers would canvass farmhouses over a 360sq km area in North Otago and South Canterbury, and anyone interested in volunteering should attend the Glenavy Hall between 10am and 1pm on Sunday, August 12.
The society needed vehicles, trailers and people to take part, he said.
The society was set up in 2010 and released 2000 salmon into the Waitaki River in May, but it now has 42,000 in the incubation shed on Welcome Stream, some of which it hopes to release next year.
All money raised on Sunday would go towards funding fish food, he said.
"All our capital expenditure has been done. We spent probably $50,000 on capital expenditure, and to keep it up and running it looks like it's going to be around $25,000 a year."
