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On a fine day, Pauatahanui inlet looks pristine, but it has become so polluted that it is no longer safe to eat shellfish. Its guardians want to change that, writes Murray Williams
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THE humble cockle is the yardstick of Pauatahanui inlet's decline. A 1976 population estimate was 608 million -- around 5000 tonnes of cockles -- but surveys in 1992 and 1995 have shown alarming decreases, with density down to a third of the first survey.
Guardians of Pauatahanui Inlet chairwoman Christine Jacobson says the last survey, in November 1998, recorded an increase to 299 million, but a warm winter may have boosted the number of young cockles.
Mrs Jacobson says there are also big doubts about the survival rate of young cockles, a species chosen for the initial survey because it is common, easy to count and measure and a good indicator of habitat change.
Cockles are filter feeders. The Pauatahanui water they filter for their food is heavily polluted with silt from subdivisions and a cocktail of other contaminants washed down creeks and stormwater drains into the 4.5-square-kilometre inlet.
That does not stop some people collecting cockles and other shellfish, ignoring signs stating daily limits and abusing people who point them out.
"We have seen people with sugarbags and big plastic bins full . . . my husband thinks they are crazy. He hasn't eaten anything (from the inlet) since 1976, when he got a severe case of gastroenteritis," says Mrs Jacobson.
Sam Rei, of Plimmerton, agrees and says local Ngati Toa...