Hunting & Gathering in New Zealand

It occurs to me that we in NZ are very lucky to have the ability still to eat off the land. Most of us would have friends or contacts or knowledge which allow us to gather food directly from the great outdoors - the oceans, the reserves, the skies, the farmlands. Over the past few months we've had fish we caught (enough that we threw some back), fresh paua from a son who gathered it in Wellington and frozen from a friend who has Chatham Island connections, beautiful fresh vegetables from another friend who grows them and home-made limoncello, again from the Chatham Islands friend. To say nothing of the trout fishermen and the plum, lemon and grapefruit trees we have connections with. And a highlight of our South Island trip was picking cherries and eating them by the kilo still warm from the sun.

Darling Adie pickled some and gave me a jar for Christmas. With friends like these who would ever go hungry!

We need to protect these privileges - it's hard to afford fish in the supermarkets because so few people own the rights to the commercial fisheries and the price for it is better off-shore - but we can (and should!) still access personal quantities wherever and whenever we can. Make sure you look after your hunting and gathering network - this stuff has value beyond the monetary! And please please do it legally and with regard for other Kiwi New Zealanders.