The Salmonisation of the South: Colonisation, Acclimatisation and

Conservation in New Zealand and South Africa

Malcolm Draper
School of Sociology and Social Studies, University of KwaZulu-Natal,
Private Bag XO1, Pietermaritzburg, South Africa. draperm@ukzn.ac.za
Conference paper presented at Colonialism, Postcolonialism, and the Environment
May 4-7, 2006, at the German Historical Institute, Washington, D.C.
A biologist would use the term indicator species. . . I speak instead of a
synecdoche. We both mean that a trout represents more than itself but that,
importantly, it does also represent itself.
David Quamman1
Overview
The salmonidae are a family of fish hailing from the northern hemisphere. Salmon are the
larger specimens, and trout their lesser cousins. The European colonisers of the southern
hemisphere called the process of translocation, acclimatisation and successful
establishment of viable self-perpetuating populations, salmonisation. This paper
expands the authors published work on trout in South Africa into a study comparing the
phenomenon with the New Zealand experience. Both settler colonies formed
acclimatisation societies which took up the responsibility of salmonisation. Both have
conservation track records, but that is where the neat parallel ends. The South Africa
study required fine-grained biographical investigation to reveal the fishy pedigree of
conservationists. Subsequent investigation found this to be obvious in New Zealands
case where the acclimatisation movement was the strongest in the world. The salmonids
show the limitations of Crosbys ecological imperialism thesis, or at least add some
texture to his idea that the success of Europeans as colonists was automatic as soon as
they put their tough, fast, fertile and intelligent animals ashore.2 South Africa does not fit
as neatly into his analysis as does New Zealand where there is a wide variety of microclimates, although relatively well-watered and temperate throughout. As Crosby shows,
the temperate regions were truly the lands of demographic takeover. European people,
plants and animals swept most competitors their path. New Zealand was free of
mammals, apart from bats, so this was a pushover. They were able to put down roots
once they had broken in the land by replacing forest with pasture. South Africa, on the
other hand, is home to the big five thus known for their sporting propensity to turn the
tables on hunters and kill them. Apart from the temperate Cape, there are sub-tropical and
semi-arid regions where settlers struggled and the water is too warm for the salmonids, or
simply dries up after the rainy season. However, in some micro-climates where trout
were established, mostly Scottish settlers saw themselves, and their totem species of fish,
1

D. Quamman, Wild Thoughts from Wild Places, (Scribner, New York, 1998), p. 20.
A. Crosby Ecological Imperialism: the overseas migration of Western Europeans as a biological
phenomenon in Donald Worster (ed) The Ends of the Earth: perspectives on modern environmental
history, (Cambs. C.U.P, Cambridge, 1988) p. 109.
2

2
occupying a vacant ecological niche in the highlands and thereby enriching the
landscape a sign of ecological health. As consciousness of bio-invasion rose in recent
times, so has the war over trout flared up in South Africa bringing attendant anxieties
over the place of Europeans in the country. By addressing the trout wars in South Africa,
and explaining why there is no war over the place of salmonids in New Zealands waters,
the paper shows how closely nationalism is linked to ecological paradigms which, in turn,
are shifted by political sea changes. While New Zealanders stand together in their
fondness of the salmonids, they have been bitterly divided over the commodification of
trout. In both countries, organized anglers have acted as a force against other forms of
agriculture negatively impacting on water quality, such as dairy farming. Salmon were
never established in South Africa as they were in New Zealand, where there are both wild
sea-run and farmed populations. But why are trout not farmed in New Zealand where
they can be found everywhere, but on the market? South Africa may have relatively small
zones suitable for raising trout, but they have pervaded the menus of the land. By wading
into such contested waters, the paper shows the subtlety of relationships between
economy, polity and society in working out ecological relationships as settler societies
settle down.
Colonisation and Acclimatisation Down South
Acclimatisation was the most important concern for Europeans bent on colonising the
world, and Africa presented them with a special challenge. In 1897, according to Luigi
Sambon, a medical doctor based in Rome, there was almost universal agreement . . .
that complete acclimatisation of Europeans in the tropics is impossible. Sambon set out
to challenge this view by arguing that climate and temperature were not the decisive
factors causing disease and the high death-rates of Europeans in the tropics. He
maintained that health laws, sanitation, more appropriate modes of life and, above all, to
the consideration which has established itself in the public mind that disease is largely
preventable. Contemplating these factors enabled the medical man to shed new light on
the question whether Europeans can become acclimatised in tropical regions which was
one of great interest [when] all European states look upon the Dark Continent as the
means of relief of the overcrowding of their populations and, of securing new markets
for the produce of their countries. The importance of Sambons Remarks cannot be
underestimated since it challenged views that persisted in the anthropological literature
well into the 20th century advocating racial interbreeding as the solution for European
colonisation of the tropics. Successful biological succession was Sambons object and
his article reads like a treatise on ecological imperialism replete with examples of how
plants and animals are the precursors of Europeans. He even cites a native proverb of
New Zealand [which] says, as the white mans rat has driven away the native rat, as the
European fly drives away our own, and clover kills our fern, so will the Maoris disappear
before the white man himself . . . Of course, we must not forget that every attempt at
colonisation is a campaign not only against man, but against a host of minute living
organisms far more fearful. But he recognised that in the tropical areas he eyed,
comprising more than a third of the globe, this would not be as automatic as in the
temperate regions: The sanitation of the unhealthy tracts in tropical lands may seem at
first a hopeless task, but intelligence, energy, and science will surely triumph. Sambons

3
Darwinistic vision saw a place for inevitable genetic flows between Europeans and
tropical natives, but sought to stem the exchange:
Intercrossing is not essential to acclimatisation, and, indeed, many of the most
successful examples of acclimatisation have occurred where there has been a
complete absence of crossing, as amongst the Jews in the Bourbon Islands and the
Boers in South Africa.3
The spread and rooting of European culture and civilisation, rather than genetic purity,
was the ultimate aim. The colonisers accompanying flora and fauna, while providing
food, transport, companionship, recreation and other resources, also served as a canary in
the mine of cultivation when massive mortality rates and fears about declining European
fertility in the tropics made the long term success of the colonising project seem very
uncertain. In this study I have not only set out to show how important the salmonids, with
their environmental sensitivity, were to colonisation, but also how salmonisation, the
cultivation, dissemination, and naturalisation of these species, is a vital key to
understanding the history of the acclimatisation societies and the rise of conservation.
While salmon may be the king, the reign of Europes natural monarch, the Atlantic
salmon never survived the move from European rivers to those of the southern
hemisphere. But trout is the prince, and what colonisers called trout culture is a vital life
blood in the veins of conservation in the south.
The importance of the acclimatisation societies has been recognised by environmental
history. Dunlaps comparative study probes the heritage of a generation's ideas about
nature and the relationship of human beings to nature: an enthusiasm for introducing
animals and birds that could be hunted or that re-minded settlers of home swept over the
Anglo settler colonies of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United States in the
second half of the nineteenth century. He shows how the movement was much stronger
in Australia and New Zealand than in Canada or the United States, for both biological
and social reasons.
Seldom have so few done so much over so large an area with so little effort (or
understanding). Now there are English skylarks in Tasmanian fields, European
rabbits across Australia and in New Zealand, and red deer in New Zealand's
forests. Across North America English sparrows fight in the gutters and starling
squabble in the trees. Everywhere the shock waves from these silent biological
explosions continue to reverberate. 4
Dunlaps expansive sweep of Anglo settlers relations with nature across North America
and the antipodes pointed out that, with the exception of Australia, the linkage between

Sambon, L. (MD, Rome). Remarks on the possibility of the Acclimatization of European in tropical
regions. British Medical Journal, January 9th, 1897. pp. 1,10, 12,14,15.
4
Dunlap, T. R., Remaking the Land: The Acclimatization Movement and Anglo Ideas of Nature
Journal of World History, 8 (2),1997, pp. 303-319

4
sport hunters and the rise of wildlife preservation, with the direct involvement of the
acclimatisation societies in New Zealand.5
I set out to show here how the significance of fish and anglers has been overlooked.
Juxtaposing New Zealand and South Africa is instructive, since a southern hemisphere
contrast can be made between the countries where the acclimatisation societies were the
strongest in the world, and the weakest. According to Lever, of the 42 societies in the
world formed from 1863 onwards, New Zealand had 24, or 57% and Australia, 11, or
26%.6 South Africa only had a few. For this reason, for an in depth understanding of the
movement, one must turn to McDowells magisterial work on New Zealands
acclimatisation societies. The Christchurch based freshwater fish biologist left no stone
unturned and revealed the origins to be in Auckland in 1861, and not Nelson in 1863 as
Lever maintained. Thus, as in Australia, New Zealands version followed a year after the
formation of the British Acclimatisation Society in 1860, listing its functions as:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.

The introduction, acclimatisation and domestication of all innoxuous animals,

birds, fishes, insects, and vegetables whether useful or ornamental;
The perfection, propagation, and hybridization of races newly introduced or
already domesticated;
The spread of indigenous animals, etc. from parts of the United Kingdom
where they are already known, to other localities where they are not known;
The procuration, whether by purchase, gift or exchange of animals, etc. from
British colonies and foreign countries;
The transmission of animals, etc. from England to her colonies and foreign
parts, in exchange for others sent thence to the society;
The holding of periodical meetings, and the publication of reports and
transactions for the purpose of spreading knowledge of acclimatisation, and
enquiry into the causes of success and failure.

McDowell notes that the Auckland society repeated almost verbatim functions 1, 2, 4 and
5, adding additional goals recognising New Zealands isolation. Brown Trout ( Salmo
Trutta), are in his estimation the Jewel in the Crown and ranks as probably the most
successful of all the activities of the acclimatisation societies. 7
In 1882, Arthur Nicols published the earliest account, The Acclimatisation of the
Salmonidae at the Antipodes, Its History and Results. He gazed at the landscapes of
Australia and New Zealand and dreamt of stalking the red deer and bringing the lordly
salmon to grass among picturesque granitic hills, which may well recall to the eye of the
sportsman many a wild scene in the highlands of Scotland or the softer glories of the Irish
Lakes. He felt that those who achieved this dream should receive the accolades of their

Dunlap, T. R., Nature and the English Diaspora: environment and history in the United States, Canada,
Australia and New Zealand, (Cambridge UP, 1999), p. 47.
6
Lever, C. They Dined on Eland: the story of the acclimatization societies, (Quiller, London, 1992).
7
R.M. McDowell, Gamekeepers for the Nation: the story of new Zealands acclimatization societies,
(Canterbury University Press, Christchurch, 1994) pp. 19, 247.

5
contemporaries for they would be recreating in new country that which is being lost in
the old;
. . . long before the end of this century when probably the ploughshare will have
invaded the haunts of the red deer, and manufacturing interests and a growing
population shall have driven the salmon in disgust from most of our rivers . . . the
sportsman will take his rifle and rod, and seek among the fern-covered ranges of
the Australian Alps and the deep tarns and pools of Tasmania and New Zealand,
the noble quarry which has found a congenial home at the Antipodes.8
Nicols accurately captures the most significant feature of acclimatisation, especially
salmonisation: it is a movement against, rather than a function of capital accumulation.
Sport or re-creation in settler society, was about building a fresh national culture distinct
from the overdeveloped mother country where nature was either becoming spoilt by
growing populations, or controlled by an elite class system. Mass fish culture was set on
a collision course with economic interests and agriculture from the outset down south.
The Trout Frontier
In 1894, a South African counterpart, the Frontier Acclimatisation Society was born with
its prime purpose the propagation and acclimatisation of trout. The genesis was a
meeting at King Williamstown on June 17, 1890, when Jack Ellis, an auctioneer and
chairman of the King Williamstown Naturalists Society, read a paper entitled Fish
culture and the introduction of trout into the Cape Colony. Elliss Naturalists Society
was formed in 1884 and was a forerunner of the Kaffrarian Museum. Ellis had from 1882
been attempting to import trout ova and had twice failed to establish trout in the Cape at
his own expense, losing them on both occasions to extreme heat. Support from the
Government of the Cape Colony was quickly forthcoming and in 1890, the year he read
his paper, the Department of Agriculture built them a hatchery at the Evelyn Forest
Station at the top of the Pirie Mountain, and threw support behind the importation of ova
to the Eastern Cape. The main obstacle to be overcome was transporting the ova on ice
for the duration of the journey which was costly. Importation to the antipodes faced a
similar challenge, since the tropics had to be circumvented via the Cape. On June 1st
1894, the King Williamstown Naturalists Society was succeeded by the Frontier
Acclimatisation Society and Ellis, the first Secretary, reported its activities to the Cape of
Good Hope Department of Agriculture, and was incorporated into the Report of the
Marine Biologist.9 At Pirie, staffed by various British pisciculturalists imported with the
ova, the first colonial ova were bred in 1897. So claim Eastern Cape inheritors of this
legacy who point out that this was an achievement against considerable odds: The story

A. Nicols, The Acclimisation of the Salmonidae at the Antipodes, Its History and Results (Sampson et.al.
London, 1882 ), p. 12.
9
J.D. Ellis, Annual Report of the Frontier Acclimatisation Society for 1896-97 in Report of the Marine
Biologist for the year 1896, Cape of Good Hope Department of Agriculture, Cape Town, 1897, pp. 30-32.

6
of the Frontier Acclimatisation Society at least for the first fifty years of its history
was dominated by a lack of money and a lack of water.10
Meanwhile in the Cape Colony, Lachlan MacLeans efforts at trout ova importation and
hatching from 1884, at Waverly Mills, Ceres, floundered. The last of three of his fish
resulting from the importation of 20 000 ova mostly at his own expense and risk, were
placed in a pond and in February 1890, they succumbed to the effects of heat, the water
in the pond having run too low. From the outset had been pressing for government
support, and when J. W. Sauer came into office as Colonial Secretary in 1890, he
heartily sympathised with the efforts being made and support was forthcoming. In 1894
a Trout Station was established at Jonkers Hoek near Stellenbosch. The original hatchery
building is now national monument. The operations moved away from Newlands where
they had continued in the old Mill House at Anneberg brewery belonging to A. Ohlsson,
M.L.A. The hatchery was directed through the Department of Agriculture and in arguing
for government involvement, Sauer could no doubt appeal to Act No. 10 of 1867 passed
by the Cape Government for the purpose of encouraging the introduction into the waters
of this Colony of fishes not native to such waters, but work at Jonkershoek continued as
a private-public partnership.11 The overseer was able to report in 1896 that: Trout may
be said to be thoroughly acclimatized to the waters of the Colony, and only await time to
increase. . . The possibility of collecting and hatching ova from Colonial fish has been
proved beyond a doubt. Most promising, yet optimistic, was the trouts vigour in spite of
the high temperatures that February: I am almost certain that trout may be able to stand a
higher temperature than they do in Europe seeing that they do not have the two extremes
of heat and cold, as here the water never falls much below 50 degrees.12
In Natal, a couple of individuals had independently been using their private resources to
abortively import brown trout ova from Scotland in 1875 and 1882. The enthusiasm of
one, John Parker, attracted the attention of a member of the Legislative Council, Cecil
Yonge who included him on a committee appointed and funded to carry out the work. In
1890, they succeeded in hatching ova and narrowly stole a march on the Cape efforts by
stocking Natal streams. Records of catches from some of these in 1892 prompted a claim
by Crass, a Natal fishery scientist who recorded this history, that it then became certain
that trout were really acclimatised. But only in 1899 did the Minister of Agriculture
approach Parker to renew stocking of the rivers after there was no doubt of the survival of
trout in Natal.13 The sundial monument on the Mooi River at Trout Bungalow reads:

10

F. Croney, The Story of the Frontier Acclimatisation Society, Ichthos Newsletter of the Society of
Friends of the J.LB. Smith Institute of Ichthyology, No. 43, September 1994, pp. 8,9.
11
Report of the Marine Biologist for the year 1897, Cape of good Hope Department of Agriculture, Cape
Town. Appendix VI. The Early History of Trout Acclimatisation in South Africa, pp. 137-140. South
African trout fishermen relish the legacy of their favourite fish emanating from a brewery. The impact of
this has been reduced since Ohlssons lager went off the market in the late 1990s.
12
Report on Trout Culture at Jonkers Hoek, by John L. Scott, Overseer in III Inland Fisheries, Report of
the Marine Biologist for the year 1896, Cape of good Hope Department of Agriculture, Cape Town, pp.27
-28.
13
B. Crass, Trout in South Africa, (MacMillan, Johannesburg, 1986,) p. 139.

7
ERECTED TO THE MEMORY OF
JOHN CLARKE PARKER
By Lovers of the Gentle Art of
TROUT FISHING
By His Untiring Efforts
TROUT
Were First Introduced Into
NATAL
CIRCA A.D. 1884
Thereby Giving Much Pleasure
To
Many Persons
1926

The inscription makes no claim to acclimatisation. The Cape definition shows a

requirement of a viable second generation. Fortunately, it is not my aim here to follow in
the footsteps of the trout pioneers setting the historical freshwater fish heritage record
straight. Rather, at this point of this exploration it is to point out that the Cape of Good
Hope Department of Agriculture Report on Trout Culture, for the year 1894, presented to
both houses of Parliament by command of His Excellency the Governor and many other
reports of Trout Culture to be found in the public record, speak volumes more than
simply about fish and the promise of fly fishing in the future. They were consciously
writing themselves into history, albeit a Cape-centric 1897 version lest the development
of what promises to prove one of the most striking features of Colonial Rivers may be
lost both to the historian and for those who may desire to repeat the experiment in other
countries. .From the Cape Colonys point of view at the time, the work thus far of Ellis
in the Eastern Province and Parker in Natal was unsuccessful and doomed to failure.
While Maclean and Ohlsson were thanked before the House of Assembly in the name of
the country for their unselfish and laudible efforts in this matter.14
Sambon alerts us to a turn of the 19th century fear that sterility of the white race ensues
after three generations in the tropics, and this has become general opinion. There were
also fears that racial interbreeding would ultimately lead to infertility.15 The word
mulatto derives from mule. So, the viability of successive generations was a criterion
for the acclimatisation of the canary in the mine species. Given that there were
simultaneous successful attempts in the temperate Cape of Good Hope, the highlands of
the Eastern Cape and Natal; a picture of a British chain emerges. Trout came via the same
route as the oaks, squirrels and starlings brought personally by Cecil John Rhodes, and
remain as an ambiguous living heritage for Cape Town. As conservationists today seek to
establish ecological corridors for the migration of wildlife from reserve to reserve (on
which the trend of transfrontier parks is founded), so Rhodes dreamt of a British corridor
and train line pushing all the way through to Cairo.
The British cannot claim acclimatisation as their legacy. The first recorded society was
the French Socit Imperial d Acclimatation, established in Paris in 1854 by the famous
14

Report of the Marine Biologist for the year 1897, Cape of Good Hope Department of Agriculture, Cape
Town. Appendix VI. The Early History of Trout Acclimatisation in South Africa, p 138.
15
Sambon, p. 12

8
zoologist Sainte-Hilaire and attracted the patronage of, amongst others, the Emperor of
France, the King of Siam, and the Emperor of Brazil.16 This was the heyday of natural
history when the zoological and botanical imagination was running riot.17 So too was
colonisation.
Colonisation in Africa was a tentative business though, and acclimatisation was about
making oneself at home in a new world, which seemed far more likely in New Zealand,
in spite of the relatively sparse pickings for capital accumulation. In Australia the New
South Wales Society saw itself in 1864 spreading over the length and breadth of the land
inestimable acquisitions to the wealth and comfort of the people18. In 1857, Charles
Hursthouse published a book designed to inform prospective immigrants in which he
proposed that New Zealand should swarm with game, and noted the absence of
predators, well watered climate, and hospitable environment. A proposal that
may be derided by some as speculation. . . But . . . might be well attended by with
social and even pecuniary benefits. . . We dont go to New Zealand with pick and
pan, to snatch dear-won nuggets, gulp gallons of rum, and then rich or ragged
hurry home. We go to the Britain of the South to create and estate, raise a home
wherein to anchor fast and plant our household goods. . . No man can better
deserve . . . a days pastime than a New Zealand colonist.19
In The Guide to South and East Africa for the Use of Tourists, Sportsmen, Invalids and
Settlers, the Union-Castle Company claimed that their man Lachlan Maclean, who, after
personally importing a consignment of [trout] ova in 1884, induced the Government to
take the matter up in 1892, the year, by the way, in which work first commenced on this
guide book.20 Although government support was forthcoming in 1890, the claims are
important, given that hunting was in the decline as game was being shot out, as the 1917
edition of The Guides section on sport admitted:
When first discovered by Europeans South Africa swarmed with game in number
and variety never equalled elsewhere. . . The wanton destruction of two centuries
has worked fearful havoc among these beautiful creatures, many districts being
destitute of animal life of any sort.21
A 1937 publication Wonderful South Africa captures in a photograph titled The Gentle
Art in Natal a white and African man, both in European clothing, not fishing but seeding
16

McDowell, p .12. Burgess, G.H.O., The Curious World of Frank Buckland, (Baker, London, 1967).
McDowell, p .12. Barber, L. The Heyday of Natural History, 1820-1870, (Cape, London, 1980).
18
Rolls, E.C. 1969, They all ran wild; the story of pests on the land in Australia, Angas and Robertson,
Sydney, p. 217.
19
In McDowell, p. 6.
20
A. Samler Brown & G. Gordon Brown (eds for the the Union-Castle Company), The Guide to South and
East Africa for the Use of Tourists, Sportsmen, Invalids and Settlers, (23rd Edition, London & Cape Town,
Sampson Low, Marston & Juta, 1917), p. 765. Since they say that the first successful attempts to introduce
trout were due to Macleans representations to the government, his own efforts, like those efforts in Natal
beginning in 1875 without state support, would have resulted in failure.
21
A. Samler Brown & G. Gordon Brown, p. 702.
17

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a river with trout. It emphasises exciting potential: the standard of fishing should grow
better every year. 22 This picture had portent since trout also played a part in racial
reconciliation during the negotiations bringing about the end of apartheid and, as I have
argued elsewhere, are a part of a new national identity emerging among the non-racial
elite.23
Acclimatisation was thus about investment, potential, creating sustainable wealth and
Europeans recreating and having fun. Squarely aiming at the African project, Sambon
wanted the pace, volume and risks to be raised:
I believe that sudden colonisation, le grand acclimatement, as the French called
it, is preferable by far to the petit acclimatement; and, in fact, what are the losses
in our system of colonisation compared with those of the past ! . . . we transfer
shiploads of emigrants to any part of the world with hardly a single loss, but we
land amongst them a host of weaklings. In the old perilous migrations of people
only a small minority reached the promised land, but they were the survival of the
fittest. This was the secret of their success.24
Sambon was advocating not only the application of scientific knowledge and hygiene, but
the laws of natural selection. A glance at the records of ova imported to South Africa,
compared to that survived and hatched, shows his ideas were being experimented with
indirectly. Trout disease and parasite control was a reported management concern in trout
acclimatisation from its African inception, and the initial successes with trout were hit
and miss, with unidentifiable disease being treated with home-spun remedies.
In New Zealand success with trout was overwhelming with much earlier success in the
1860s, but a similar mixture of private initiative, acclimatisation society work and
government support, relying at first on successful imports to Tasmania which became
Australias most successfully salmonised state. As in South Africa, the rainbow trout
soon followed from North America and became widely distributed. What is interesting
about the rainbow is that it fulfilled a dream of the European acclimatisation societies to
add to their list of useful animals domesticated from elsewhere. Large portions of the
trout caught by British fly fishers in reservoirs today, and sold commercially for the table,
are hatchery raised rainbows. The faster growth and more efficient protein conversion of
the rainbow, and its reputed willingness to take the less skilled fishermans flies and put
up an acrobatic fight, make it more widely cultivated. Yet the brown retains a certain elite
snob value for its cunning ways, but is mostly sought after in the uncultivated
environment of a clear stream, which all salmonids need to breed. The rainbow
dominates some of New Zealands large fisheries, most famously Taupo, which partly
inspired American western writer Zane Greys Anglers Eldorado and attracted him in
the 1920s.25 A steady stream of American anglers followed pushing further and further
into the backcountry with local guides and helicopters, and contributing substantially to
22

Wonderful South Africa (Johannesburg, Associated Newspapers Ltd, 1937), p. 144.

Draper, M. Going Native? Trout and Settling Identity in a Rainbow Nation, Historia 48(1), 2003.
24
Sambon, p. 12.
25
Grey, Z. Anglers Eldorado Zane Grey in New Zealand, (Reed, Wellington, 1982).
23

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tourist revenue. Much like the East-West rivalry in the United States, there is a South
Island-North Island jostling and Southern men speak disparagingly of the Northern
fishing techniques which only scare the wily browns away where they predominate in the
clear freestone streams of the South Island.
Imperial Pisciculture on Ice
The most noted prelude to the British acclimatisation movement became known as the
Eland Dinner of January 1959 organised by Richard Owen, an eccentric palaeontologist
at the British museum. There were giant pike on the menu from the east, but it was the
with the addition of African venison to the British diet and agriculture that Owen mainly
wished to pique the national imagination and fantasized about troops of eland gracefully
galloping over [Britains] green sward and herds of koodoos . . . added to the list of
foods good for the inhabitants of not only England, but Europe in general.26 McDowell
notes the context of food shortages in Britain, meat in particular and refers to Lynn
Barbers comment that during the heyday of natural history sheer patriotism demanded
some gustatory return for the vast and rapid expansion of the British empire. McDowell
remarks in parenthesis with no reference to Crosby; Is it any wonder that there have
been allusions to the ecological imperialism of Europe?27
Ironically, New Zealand and South Africa went into post World War II competition for
the European venison market, with New Zealand emerging as undisputed victor, a
position of global dominance it still retains, while South Africa has a large sport hunting
industry.28 So the modern venison story might well support an ecological imperialism
thesis, but in New Zealand, the domestication and commercialisation of deer was a
initiated as a result of concern about deteriorating habitat, rather than capital
accumulation. Trout history in the colonies from the outset provides a far stronger
counter-narrative to ecological imperialism and the spread of commodities, especially in
so far as the acclimatisation societies were concerned. Refrigerated shipping was the
technology that enabled the antipodes to sell mutton as well as wool to the world, and
venison followed but trout never did, in spite of the abundance in New Zealand.
A name bringing South Africa and New Zealands trout histories together in that of Frank
Buckland. He attended Owens famous Eland dinner and organised another exploratory
and adventurous dinner soon thereafter to launch the Society for the Acclimatisation of
Animals in the United Kingdom. It was a gastronomic tour de force, and not for the
squeamish or fainthearted. Buckland, however, later made his name through his
involvement in the shipment of salmon and trout to Australia and soon thereafter, New
Zealand.29 According to Natals Bob Crass; If we want to go back to the very beginning
of South African trout acclimatisation, perhaps we should start with Frank Buckland
26

McDowell p. 12. Bompas, G.C. Life of Frank Buckland (Smith, Elder, London, 1885). . .
MCDowell, p. 12. Barber, L. 1980.
28
Draper, M. Taking Stock of Domestication and Medical Matters: Wild, Tame and Feral Life in New
Zealand and South Africa, Unpublished paper presented Livestock, Diseases and Veterinary Medicine
Conference St. Antonys College, Oxford, November 2005.
29
MCDowell, p. 13.
27

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whose experiments showed that salmon eggs would retain their vitality after being
stowed on ice for 100 days.30 According to McDowell, there are competing accounts, But
it was more Bucklands proprietary flamboyance than his originality in thinking that have
made him so prominent in this legacy. The idea is first attributed to an Australian, James
Bidwell, the Commissioner of Crown Lands in New South Wales, who was known for
his very early explorations of New Zealand in the 1850s. He wrote in a letter to the
Governer of van Diemens Land (Tasmania) dated 12 June 1852 that
when travelling New Zealand and admiring its noble rivers . . I could not help
lamenting that they should be so scantily stocked with fish, and I was gradually
led to speculate on the best means of supplying the deficiency by the introduction
of Salmon and other valuable fish from the rivers of Europe.
Bidwell suggested packing the spawn on ice, to keep them alive for a much longer time
than would be required and made his priorities clear:
I originally thought of means of introducing Salmon into the Southern
Hemisphere for the benefit of New Zealand, in which colony I always felt great
interest, some time before saw any notice of the Tasmanian movement for the
same purpose. . .
Apart from his suggestion of shipping ova in ice, Bidwell has proved to be a visionary
since New Zealands rivers are renown in the world of fly fishing, while Tasmania is a
minor destination with most sport to be had in its lakes and hydro-electric impoundments.
South African trout fishing is so marginal that its following is mostly local.
The ice experiments were conducted in Britain by the owner of the Wenham Lake Ice
Company, E.H. Moscrop, showing that 146 days of viability and sufficient for the voyage
to the antipodes. He claimed that this was done amid scepticism of his contemporaries.
Buckland only provided brown trout ova for the export of 1864. But Buckland
personifies the enthusiasm of the time for salmonisation. He made a name for himself in
London as a writer of fishing and natural history and ran a well known fish museum
wanting to catch the imagination of Londoners who watched his salmon ova hatching and
developing in the window in Fleet Street. He became British inspector of Salmon
Fisheries.31
Aquaculture, or more specifically, pisciculture, the domestic cultivation and breeding of
fish, dates back to the early Egyptian dynasties.32 Carp ponds existed in China at least
2500 years ago, and carp farming was refined under the Song dynasty (A.D. 960-1279).
By 1988 China had become the worlds largest producer of fish.33 Pisciculture received a
30

Crass, 1980, p. 135.

McDowell, pp. 230, 232, 250.
32
F. Shaw, The Complete Science of Fly Fishing and Spinning, (Fred Shaw, London ,1920), p. 97.
Domestic cultivation has proved to be part of the salvation of the wild salmon in Scotland, but has not been
without negative environmental impact.
33
J.R. McNeill, Something New Under the Sun: an environmental history of the twentieth century world,
(W.W. Norton, New York, 2000), p. 251.
31

12
European impulse in Germany during the early 18th century and was inaugurated in
Britain in 1837 with effort initially concentrated on salmon.34 The Cape Colony records
the significance of a particular event which is worth repeating in full:
The International Fisheries Exhibition of 1883 was the means amongst other
things of directing attention to an interesting new feature of the fishing industry,
namely the artificial propagation of the Salmonidae, and the Acclimatisation of
fish generally. Means were afforded of seeing the actual working of a hatchery,
and representatives from various countries described the efforts that were then
being made to foster this new industry. The Howietown hatchery was then in
working order in Scotland ; in Canada they were turning about `30 millions of the
Salmonidae per annum through the artificial process ; in America several rivers
completely deprived of the Salmonidae have been restocked, and the whole of the
Pacific coast producing fish to the value of something like three million dollars a
day, was thoroughly under the control of fish culture.
It was fortunate that a representative from the Cape [Lachlan MacLean of
the Union-Castle Mail Steamship Company] should have had an opportunity at
this exhibition of learning something of this new departure in fisheries, and of
seeing the great benefit to this country that would follow by stocking its barren
rivers with valuable fish, and that he should have taken the matter up with
enthusiasm.35
Successful, but Kingless, Salmonisation
New Zealanders trace their salmonid legacy to a Scottish game keeper, John Shaw, who
carried out experiments showing that the rate that ova developed was dependent on water
temperatures, with lower temperatures retarding development.36 Scotlands Howie
Hatchery provided a model for the world to follow. In Scotland, salmon are still sacred,
with ancient laws prohibiting angling in salmon rivers on the Sabbath still in effect. Since
the Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar) is widely acclaimed as the king of Europes sporting
fish, and was a primary species for acclimatisation in the antipodes and South Africa, it
ranks as the societies most iconic failure. It is an unfulfilled but lingering dream and as
recently as 1983, the Nelson Society proposed that the species be introduced into the
Buller River.37
Success with the quinnat salmon from North America was eventually achieved in New
Zealand, but this was not a legacy to which the societies could lay claim. It also does not
share the sporting or culinary reputation of the Atlantic salmon, nor the deep cultural
affection the Europeans felt for the brown trout. However, like the KwaZulu-Natals
34

F. Shaw, (1920), p. 97. McDowell, 230.

Report of the Marine Biologist for the year 1897, Cape of Good Hope Department of Agriculture, Cape
Town. Appendix VI. The Early History of Trout Acclimatisation in South Africa, p 138.
36
Arthur, W. History of Fish Culture in New Zealand, Transactions & Proceedings of the N.Z. Institute,
(1882), 14, p. 182. Cited in McDowell, p. 230.
37
McDowell, Chap. 15 Atlantic Salmona lingering but unfulfilled dream pp. 229-246. Ironically the
Buller River catchment of the South Island enjoys conservation status and is a site of struggle between
angling and agriculture.
35

13
brown trout, the quinnat salmon in New Zealand is a fish that needed a committee.38
Unlike trout in New Zealand however, the quinnat salmon became commercially
exploited and provided the basis of a fishing industry in New Zealand. It was the only
salmonid the societies supported farming or harvesting wild stock. Unlike other fisheries,
the government managed the resource, not the societies. The quinnat developed a
recreational following too, but fishermen failed to rise to an effective defence when
government confounded its own plans for the development of a salmon resource by
damming the Waitaki River at Kurow in 1935.
Trout in New Zealand enjoyed a more protected history as colonial fish. Through the
societies, a strong lobby of anglers was always readily mobilised to defend their habitat
and a strong conservation movement emerged in civil society as a result. Most
significantly, the societies successfully resisted the commercial farming or harvesting in
any form, of trout. The motives for the introduction of Atlantic salmon did have
economic strands, and these pulled continuously at New Zealands trout resource, but
never were able to move the societies anchored position that this would ultimately be to
the detriment of the recreational trout resource, and the habitat upon which their species
depended. Once again, McDowall excels in documenting the saga. My favourite
quotation in his chapter on the subject comes from the Fishing Industry General Manager,
Jim Campbell: As it stands about the only way a housewife can get hold of trout or
salmon for the family table is to marry a fishermanand who would want to do that?
That was 1972 ,when trout farming became a fascinatingly contested election issue on
which Labour and the acclimatisation societies saw eye to eye, and an enduring political
question in the decades thereafter.39
Trout Hatcheries in the Post-Colonial Ecology of a Settled South
Where they were in the strongest in the world, the acclimatisation societies managed
most of New Zealands inland natural resources as representatives of the hunting and
fishing fraternity, and proved to be a formidable force in civil society that both the state
and capital had to reckon with. Quite early into the 20th century their initial function had
been abandoned. Since they had begun to focus their energies on conserving the habitat
that their favourite fish and game depended upon, their acclimatisation title had become
an anachronism that not many New Zealanders understood. In the case of deer, and
many other species, the emphasis on habitat protection meant the recognition that the
animals should be totally eliminated. All protection was removed and a perennially open
season was declared. Some ecologists who are fond of hunting maintain that a low
concentration of deer imitate the forest browsing of the extinct Moa. Although freshwater
scientists such as McDowell now recognise that trout populations in lakes and rivers
have had a devastating effect on native fishes,40 their place in New Zealand has never
been questioned by conservation policy makers. This could be a result of the
38

McDowell, Chap. 15. Quinnat Salmonthe fish that needed a committee, pp. 260-287.
Cited in McDowall, p. 148. See his Chapter 10 Commercialisationsociety attitudes towards trout
farming pp. 136-151. McDowall also notes that fly fishing rather than hunting became increasingly
popular with women over the years, but the societies remained male dominated.
40
McDowall, p. 466.
39

14
acclimatisation societies being, as one commentator put it; more appropriately described
as the local government arm of fish and wildlife management, and act as agents for
[government departments] who are primarily responsible for the two statutes [the
Wildlife and Fisheries Acts].41
The acclimatisation societies 130 year history came to head during the wave of changes
in New Zealand brought about by the election of the Lange Labour Government in 1984.
The Minister for the Environment, Geoffrey Palmer, made it his mission to reduce the
number of quangos in public life. (A quango is a unique New Zealand acronym for
quasi-autonomous non-government organisation). The acclimatisation society system was
disbanded in 1990, and a new structure was created called Fish and Game New Zealand
with a network of councils throughout the land responsible for managing fishing and
hunting resources. MacDowell offers two readings of this transformation: Death and
resurrectionor metamorphosis. He also offers a balanced reading of their legacy a
mixed bag of mistakes and unintended consequences, yet when they were disbanded,
New Zealand
still had superb angling and quality hunting that were resources of great value to
its people and a lure for tourists from overseas. These resources were in large
measure established and maintained by the acclimatisation societiesand a living
legacy in which they could take considerable pride.42
The backbone of the societies, and their major source of income, was their license holders
who continue to enjoy access to sport far superior to that enjoyed by the nobility in
Britain. Indeed, everymans access was the acclimatisation societies goal reflecting
colonists intention to escape poverty, aristocratic oppression, overcrowding in the cities,
environmental pollution and inculcate an invigorated masculinity in a new Mans
Country.43 McDowell titled his study Gamekeepers for the Nation, to make the point that
it was the gamekeeper and gillie model that the societies sought to avoid. Public river
access to through private property via the Queens Chain is still intact, although private
interests continuously seek to curtail it. This pits organised anglers into a tense
relationship with some farmers about access issues, with Fish and Game championing
their cause. As has been the case in conservation more broadly around the world, the
rights of private ownership are contested and the notion of stewardship was advocated
by Fish & Game New Zealands editor Bob South who appealed to indigenous
understandings of land, claiming that when it comes to the great outdoors today, two of
the loudest words reverberating around New Zealand are ownership and stewardship.
The mention of either polarises users of the resource. The word is a lineal descendant of
the Old Norse sti-vardr which literally means the keeper of the house. He goes of to
quote George Anderson from a piece of prose titled Can Flyfishing Survive the TwentyFirst Century? in which the author asks why flyfishing should be of concern in the face
pressing global problems such as overpopulation, poverty, political destabilisation and;

41

Cited in McDowall, p. 453,454.

McDowell, p. 468.
43
J. Phillips, A Mans Country: the making of the Pakeha male, . . . .
42

15
AIDS would seem to take precedence over enticing some silly little trout to bit a
hook wrapped with fur and feathers. Flyfishing, however, is like the legendary
canary in the mine shaft. Flyfishing is a litmus test, if you will, for our
environment. If you cannot protect out rivers and fisheries, or strive to make
flyfishing a quality experience, our commitment to stewardship has failed.44
In 2001 following a national conference of all its councils, Fish and Game New Zealand
launched its Dirty Dairying campaign aimed at the booming industry as a whole,
drawing attention its growing impact on the countrys lowland rivers. It was a success
and debate soon resulted in action on the part of government agencies and organised
agriculture. One result, however, was Federated Farmers, the national farmers union,
publicly attacking Fish and Game, and urging its members to deny access to anglers and
hunters seeking permission to cross their land to fish and hunt. (The Queens Chain has
many weak links.) This stand off was soon eased, with the recognition that New
Zealands agriculture relies in large measure, as does its tourism, on a clean green
image to obtain global market advantage.45 2002 was election year, and a bumper sticker
loudly proclaimed that One Million Kiwis Fish, Shoot and Vote! (There are only four
million people in New Zealand.)
Land issues dictated that Fish and Game New Zealand do not administer the Taupo
Districts fishery. Instead this is managed by the Department of Conservation, Te Papa
Atawhai, under the Conservation Act of 1987, the Taupo Fishing Regulations 1984, the
Maori Land Amendment and Maori Land Claims Adjustment Act 1926. The ticket
stipulates as regulation no. 11: The taking of Koura and other fish indigenous to Lake
Taupo is permitted only for members of the Ngati Tuwharetoa tribe.46 The Department
of Conservation operates the Tongariro National Trout Centre on the river with the same
name near Turangi in the Taupo catchment. According to the publicity brochure;
Usually, the Trout Centres hatchery just rears trout for the childrens fishing
pond, but it is also a safeguard for the Taupo fishery. If some disaster, like a
major volcanic eruption, wiped out the wild fish, the hatchery could be used to
restock the streams and lakes.
The Department of Conservation manages the facility association with the Tongariro
National Trout Centre Society which see its role as fostering public interest in, and
understanding of, the Taupo fishery, other freshwater fisheries and freshwater ecology
through development of the Trout Centre and wider promotion and education
programmes.47
A similar motif extolling the ecological virtues of trout fishing was sign-boarded outside
the Kamberg trout hatchery in the Natal Drakensberg in South Africa, and trout fishing
44

B. South, Stewardship versus Ownership, Fish & Game New Zealand, 42, 2003, pp. 13, 14.
B. Johnson, A Big Win, Directors Comment, Fish and Game New Zealand, 14, p. 9.
46
From a Taupo District License to Fish for Trout 2003-2004 Season, purchased 14 December, 2003 on
another tough day of fieldwork.
47
Tongariro National Trout Centre brochure collected December 2003.
45

16
was regulated by conservation legislation. The then Natal Parks Board operated trout
hatcheries within the Park at Royal Natal and Kamberg from which rivers and dams in
the Park and outside were stocked for many years. The last trout hatchery operated by the
post-apartheids integrated conservation agency, Ezmemvelo KwaZulu-Natal Wildlife at
Kamberg was closed in 2004;
thus bringing the organisation and Park in line with modern thinking that it is
inappropriate for conservation agencies to breed and distribute alien invasive
species. Some dams within the Park are still stocked with trout for tourism
purposes. The impacts of trout have unfortunately not been formally documented
in the Drakensberg ecosystem, but there is much scientific evidence from similar
ecosystems in other parts of the world that introduced alien fish can have
significant negative impacts on indigenous amphibian, fish, bird and invertebrate
fauna. Circumstantial evidence suggests that at least one endemic species of
dragonfly has gone extinct in the Drakensberg due to trout (M. Samways pers.
comm.) and that amphibian populations are significantly negatively impacted (R.
Karssing pers. comm - unpubl. data). Data from Lesotho indicates that
Drakensberg minnows cannot co-exist with trout (LHDA Contract report, 2001).48
Of course much debate preceded this event and the new South African Biodiversity Act
was invoked, but the move followed on the heels of the succession of a fly fisherman
CEO of Scottish extraction, George Hughes with a Zulu non-flyfishing CEO, Khulani
Mkhize.49 A marine scientist who established himself with work on turtle conservation
research, Hughes used his position to put a lid on the trout debate. It was widely
understood in his organisation that they are a sacrosanct subject. This is not to say that
black Africans are adverse to trout. Far from it. A trout fishing trip might well have
helped broker the elite pact that ushered South Africans into a peaceful transition from
apartheid. A similar about turn on the trout issue took place when Cape Department of
Conservation had a change of leadership to an Afrikaner non-fly fishing director who
acknowledged that Cape Nature Conservation was literally built on the foundations of a
trout hatchery.50 The old Jonkershoek Hatchery is a recognised monument and
Jonkershoek continues to provide stocked dams for flyfishing.
Cape Nature Conservation was founded in 1952 by a trout scientist, Douglas Hey, the son
of S.A. Hey, trout fisherman of Scottish and German extraction who had worked for the
Frontier Acclimatisation Society at the Pirie Hatchery and stocked many of the Eastern
Cape streams. The FAS Trout Club continues to provide flyfishing for its members by
stocking Maden Dam near King Williams Town with hatchery raised fish. The only other
two acclimatisation societies I have found record of in South Africa were trout fishing
societies and seem to have slunk into extinction.51 Until Douglas Hey retired in 1979, all
48

Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife. 2005. Integrated Management Plan: uKhahlamba Drakensberg Park World
Heritage Site, South Africa. Ezemvelo KZN Wildlife, Pietermaritzburg, p. 15.
49
See Science in Africa, May 2002 and KZN Wildlifes own journal Wildside and the ecotourism magazine
Getaway, over this period.
50
See M. Draper, Going Native?, 2003.
51
The Transvaal Trout Acclimatisation Society was formed in 1903 with President Lord Milner and
committee members Julius Jeppe and Sir Percy Fitzpatrick. From 1916, Lionel Day was contributing to the

17
four directors of South Africas nature conservation agencies were involved in inland
fisheries in the early years of their careers, and emerged from trout hatcheries. The true
inheritor of the acclimatisation movement is South Africas Federation of Fly Fishers
(FOSAF). Its roots are at Pirie Hatchery and was formed in 1897 as a response to Cape
Nature Conservations removal of protection for trout, but went on to become the
countrys most active freshwater conservation organisation continuously drawing
attention to the flight of indigenous fish in the countrys warmer lower lying
watersheds.52
Native Fish and the Indigenisation of Southern Conservation
The Western Districts Game Protection Association was formed in the Cape of Good
Hope 1890, to which Trout was added in 1902, and it assumed responsibility for the
introduction of the fish to the Western Cape. Growing out of this body, the Cape
Piscatorial Society was formed in 1931 and in 1999 still proudly upheld the credo of
Extending and encouraging the culture and protection of Trout and other desirable
freshwater fish in the Cape.53 FOSAFs Yellow Fish Working Group is a major actor in
the South African freshwater fish conservation scene which has, by and large, been
deregulated and thus neglected by the state. When FOSAFs Dean Impson, a fish scientist
(at Rhodes Universitys Department of Ichthyology and Fisheries Science) was asked at
FOSAFs 2002 conference why the brown trout is still FOSAFs publicity icon, Impson
replied we are still in a process of development.54
In both New Zealand and South Africa, acclimatisers went to war on competitors and
predators of their trout. In this sense they were true inheritors of the British game
keepers tradition of destroying vermin, in the British case the aquatic villain and
coarsest of coarse fish, the pike. Thus while a trout stream has a charm all its own and
pleasant times may be spent by the waterside enjoying the bird, animal and insect
life, and the many joys nature has to offer. The river keeper has much to occupy
his time; indeed, he is a very busy man if he does his job properly. Constant war
must be waged against the natural enemies of trout. . . Opinions differ over the
innocence of the otter, but it is the opinion that of experienced keepers that, on a
trout stream, the good deeds of Lutra does in killing pike and eels far outweigh
his sins in taking a few trout. 55

Fisheries Departments annual report in his capacity as Chairman of the Estcourt Flyfishers and Trout
Acclimatisation Society in Natal. B. Crass, Trout in South Africa, pp. 159, 164.
52
See M. Draper, Going Native?, 2003. The first president was journalist Fred Croney who penned The
Story of the Frontier Acclimatisation Society, Ichthos Newsletter of the Society of Friends of the J.LB.
Smith Institute of Ichthyology, No. 43, September 1994, pp. 8,9.
53
E. Herbst, The Cape Piscatorial Society: Sixty-eight years of service to angling and conservation,
(1999) http://www.smallstreams.com/cps.html,. accessed 8 May, 2000.
54
FOSAF National Conference Press Release, 23 March 2002.
55
Chap.15 Duties of a River Keeper in A Game Keepers Handbook, (Gilbertson & Page, Ltd., Hertford,
Herts, 1954), pp. 50-53.

18
The British Game Keepers Handbook was published after the Second World War and
was clearly struggling with the ecological perspective, let alone rising sentiment about
animals, otters in particular which by then had caught the popular imagination. The joys
of nature certainly did not include eels.
In the second article of the 1884 Treaty of Waitangi, upon which New Zealand is based,
Her Majesty the Queen of England confirms and guarantees to the Chiefs and Tribes of
New Zealand and to the respective families and individuals thereof the full exclusive and
undisturbed possession of their Lands and Estates Forests Fisheries and other properties
which they may collectively or individually possess so long as it is their wish and desire
to retain the same in their possession. Despite this assurance, acclimatisers and colonists
went to war on the Maoris eel population, viewing them as a threat to introduced game
species, but also a resource to be harvested. Research published in 1968 prove that eel
predation on trout might reduce quantity of fish, but improved the quality (size) of the
trout. Some acclimatisation societies were slow to acclimatise themselves to these
findings, but came around in the end.56
Today, there seems to be wide recognition that they co-exist harmoniously. The threat to
eels appears to be New Zealands dependence on hydro-electric power. The
impoundments block the passage of the elvers upriver and grind the adults coming
downstream. Between the state, science and the electricity companies, not enough is
understood, cared for or being done. This is the view of, a Maori, Bill Kerrison, Coordinator of the Freshwater Indigenous Fisheries Programme, a non-government
organisation falling under the Kokopu Charitable Trust. Drawing on a blend of
indigenous knowledge and science, his organisation has developed a technique for
ensuring the passage of elvers up the rivers. When I met him, a government scientist
came to him for research elvers and advice.57 South Africa does not have a black Africa
freshwater fishing culture or tradition in its waters where trout live. Nguni and Sesotho
people fish for them in the highlands today and amongst most Nguni people a strong set
of taboos existed around rivers and fish that began to weaken in the 1960s. There remains
much to be said about indigenous fish and fishing, but the point really is that the trout has
been effectively naturalised in New Zealand, so too has the brown trout in the United
States. But the salmonisation of South Africa has been contested. Why? What does this
say about conservation, politics and economics?
At one level one can read this phenomenon as a triumph of conservation biology in South
Africa which has been able to more effectively shed its colonial ideology than neoEurope temperate countries of demographic takeover where ecological ideology remains
saturated with European ideas of nature. Trout have come to be viewed as noxious aliens
in South Africa. I opened with the theme of how important they were to the colonisers
own prospects of acclimatisation in Africa, so little wonder Trout Culture takes this
about turn on their desirability so seriously. New Zealands has sophisticated
conservation institutions and science, but seems to not have progressed much beyond its
56

McDowall, pp. 152- 163.

Video interview by author in context at the elver trap at the foot of the wall of Lake Matalina, 12
December, 2003.
57

19
first conservationist, Walter Buller, the ornithologist, natural historian and missionarys
son who, according to Goeff Parks very important book, set out in 1868 to subvert his
settler cultures agenda for the land whose every acre it was desperate to cultivate,
keeping alive a forest his neighbours would have felled and swamps they would have
drained. At the end of Buller Road, the Papaitonga Reserve, is central to the New
Zealand landscape. It was here that a government first responded to the popular and
political doctrine we call conservation and kept a piece of lowland forest from being
farmed . . . Buller was a vociferous opponent of acclimatisation of vermin like rabbits
and weasels, but his was a vision of a reserve fashioned like England great estates that
included many introduced birds and trout for the lake. As much as he was a sympathiser
with indigenous people and animals, his Darwinism saw them as doomed to natural
succession by fitter species and the reserve denied Maori people their land and hence
fishing rights for eels. 58
Warming to Acclimatisation in Global Culture
If one were to forgive the unintended errors of the acclimatisation movement, then one
might generously say they embody a groundswell of conservation developing while
settler culture came to terms with its new home. Once the last gold nuggets had been
brutally extracted from New Zealands rivers by hydraulic mining, so the trout came to
be seen as a sustainable treasure to be carefully guarded and its habitat conserved for
local enjoyment and a growing tourism market in search of Pure New Zealand, as it is
now branded. The acclimatisation societies work, and its successor Fish and Game New
Zealands confrontation with the dairy industry in the lowlands, gives counter-evidence
to Parks view that in New Zealand almost all 20th century conservationists, timid before
authority of agriculture and timber interests, focused their effort on islands and highelevation wildernesses.59 FOSAFs Yellow Fish Working Groups similar campaigns
against pollution in South African warm water, shows that there is more to western
conservation than setting nature aside in large tracts of land as reserves in an imagined
state of innocence. As Nigel Clark recently argued, awareness of bioinvasion has
everywhere unsettled environmental cosmopolitanism. Not totally so in New Zealand. He
cites an Australian biologists despairing conclusion that acclimatisers were true
internationalists with the whole world in their sights.60 The acclimatisation tradition has
always been sensitive to temperature and the salmonids are not only a totem species for
European culture. In Alaska, both Inuit and settler are expressing concern about their
state being the canary in the mine of global warming as the lower 48 push their fossilfuel lifestyle and drilling interests north into Americas Last Frontier. Salmon runs are
being affected and hopefully at some point, desalmonisation will warm global culture to
a boiling point of environmental cosmopolitanism strong enough to challenge this
hegemony, if we are to acclimatise sufficiently to be successful colonisers of Earth. Trout
and salmon culture have a track record to be reckoned with in matters environmental,
58

G. Park Nga Uruora The Groves of Life: Ecology and History in a New Zealand Landscape, (Victoria
University Press, Wellington, 1995) pp. 170, 215p. 215
59
G. Park, p. 317.
60
N. Clark, The Demon Seed: Bioinvasion as the Unsettling of Environmental Cosmopolitanism, Theory
Culture and Society, 19(1-2), 2002, pp. 101-125. T. Low, Feral Future, (Viking, Ringwood Vic,1999).

20
having proved to be influential in shaping the state and challenging capital. In New
Zealand, Tasman District Mayor called the Fish and Game license holder an industrial
saboteur and a radical green fishing fanatic and bird counting, snail watching freak.61
Anglers might yet be mobilised in surprising ways.62 I hope to have at least drawn
attention to them and their acclimatisation roots, as having been overlooked by a huntingcentric view of environmental history which, while it is beginning to recognise the role of
agriculture in the rise of conservation, has neglected freshwater pisciculture. A fuller
paper could explore how fly fishing has followed the passage from the age of natural
history to the age scientific ecology, from a gentle art steeped in tradition, to a science
which still makes much ethical recourse to its roots in gentle art. This provides a key to
unlocking the aesthetic in conservation which seems to survive ecological paradigm
shifts when the political status quo remains unchallenged. The very different place of
trout in the conservation and economic agenda of the state down south today shows how
ecological paradigms and economic interests flow from a nations culture and history,
rather than from scientific research. Conservation is thus much more a story of
domestication and nation-building than that of a pristine wilderness ideal.

61
62

Deans, N. Industrial Sabotage?, Fish and Game New Zealand, 17, 2003.
Fish and Game New Zealand carry feature articles on the effect of global warming on river flow.