Spearfishers are taking aim at freshwater pests instead of dwindling marine species.

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On the hunt for catfish

Brown bullhead catfish rightly belong in North America, but in 1877, someone saw fit to bring 140 of them to New Zealand and tip them into a lake. Nobody knows why. They are miserable eating and offer no sporting fight. (If you still want to catch one, they like cheese, apparently).

Catfish have also become a freshwater pest, feasting on native species—which is why an international spearfishing competition aims to hunt as many of Lake Taupō's catfish as possible.

No expansion for Foulden Maar mine site

Plaman Resources, the company planning to mine Foulden Maar, has withdrawn its bid to buy more land around the proposed site. However, the company still owns 42 hectares of land covering 80 per cent of the maar, reports Farah Hancock at Newsroom, meaning the maar's fossils are still at risk of destruction.

Here's why this treasure trove of prehistoric New Zealand life is important.

Walk like a shark

When spider monkeys, honey bees, or sharks are foraging for food, they’ll use a pattern of movement called a Lévy walk—random but correlated steps with no destination in sight.

Living under a rock

It's been alone for two million years, during which time it lost the ability to fly, and its habitat has shrunk to just a few hundred metres of stream with a view of Dunedin Airport.

Frog apocalypse

Chytrid fungus is the Genghis Khan of the amphibian world: it has spent the past 50 years invading nations one by one, slaughtering as it goes.

Explore East Cape from your armchair

East Cape is one of the first places in the world to see the light of the new day. It will also be one of the first to experience the brunt of human-induced climate change and, being economically vulnerable, one of the least able to accomodate the dramatic changes it brings to life, industry and the environment.

Check out all the NZ-VR experiences here.

Photographer of the Year 2019 open for entries

Ladies and gentlemen, warm up your motordrive, charge your intervalometer, entries for the 2019 New Zealand Geographic Photographer of the Year are now open!


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