Marine NZ

New Zealanders love the ocean. It is beautiful and diverse, teeming with a fantastic array of sea life. Our team at MarineNZ are all actively involved in marine conservation and education. We believe NZ needs a website that can bring the NZ marine environment to your computer. We also believe that we can all do more to restore and protect marine life and being amongst it even virtually on your computer is a starting point. It will be an adventure in discovery for all us. In time we hope to involve many of you in building and using this site. We have many ideas on the drawing board.

MarineNZ.org will become a virtual marine online world, full of stunning underwater photography, videography and leading marine biology reports and presentations. There are tools for students, teachers and all those interested in our marine environment. There’s also information on our streams and rivers, and how they interact with our beaches and oceans. Tour our site to find out more. You can also register, which will allow you to make comments and receive our newsletters.

Take the time to get involved with our new online community where you’ll meet others working marine conservation, science and education. Share your passions and ideas, ask questions and take part in active discussion.

MarineNZ gives all New Zealanders access to the beauty beneath the Sea. Dive in and enjoy.

VELVET: the Travelling Tuna Tapestry on Display in Whangarei this Saturday

18 Jan 2012 | 1 Comments

A Project to Help Return the Mauri (Life & Soul) to the Wai (Water)

The Northland based Mountains to Sea Conservation Trust will be showcasing an ambitious international environmental & social art project, in which all visitors are invited to be a part, that focuses on New Zealand’s own native longfin eel!

Several years ago Stephanie Bowman, an artist and science educator from the southwest desert of the United States came to NZ as a traveller longing to experience what she believed to be a land of pristine, healthy waters. But, when she visited the South Island’s Lake Rotoiti she found herself falling in love with a mysterious, graceful (and sometimes slimy!) fish that revealed to her a different story hidden beneath the surface of our blue waters. “The longfin (eel) is simply amazing”, says Stephanie, four round-trip tickets later, but still with a look of astonishment in her eyes. “These threatened and important top predators are found nowhere else in the world and are a crucial part of this country’s cultural history”. Indeed, not only can the longfin eel live over 100 years before being able to reproduce once, but when they do set off out to sea to mate, they morph and become creatures of the ocean depths, travelling thousands of kilometers to the deep sea trenches near Tonga where they
finally mate and die. After making an ancient and risky journey, the elvers (baby eels) re-appear to live in New Zealand’s freshwaters a couple years later.