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A Kingfish swims in the wild
- photo courtesy of The ITM Fishing Show 
UPDATE: 22 February 2010
It has now been some time since the release of kingfish go wild with mostly an all quiet approach in regards to the tags or tag returns.
In the months following we had a number of tags returned from juvenile fish caught in nets or reported re- released looking well.
It would also be fair to say that we would have suffered a number of fatalities as the fish adapted to the wild environment. And adapt they would, because at the time of the releases the harbours were sporting strong stocks of smelt and white bait of which the kingfish quickly adapted to.
We know this from the Raglan caged release where the fish were quickly observed to be feeding on bait. Unfortunately the tide was stronger than expected through the cage causing some fish to tire early with some mortalities recorded. This necessitated an early release and from these the fish appear to have made their way out over the bar with some heading south and others north as we have had confirmed tag reports from both directions.
Up north we had reports of fish being caught up to four months later with fish re-released in healthy condition. From this we assume that they were adapting to the wild.
Whangarei reported seeing schools of juvenile kingfish monstering the bait in the harbour. These were most like from a release of juveniles from the NIWA Bream Bay Hatchery which also confirmed the ability of these fish to adapt to the wild.
Reports in the Hauraki Gulf indicate that some have headed south around Cape Colville and some north to Little Barrier. However the most recent report suggests that some have remained in the Gulf and are at the bottom end of Waiheke Island.
These fish are now expected to be of legal size and could be taken. We remain unsure as to how long the kingfishgowild tags will last or stand up to the rigours of time.
However we do ask that any angler catching a kingfish with one of our tags please return it to us with the catch details or if released still please advise.
What will the future hold?? We are committed to keep this web site running and if another opportunity presents itself we will look at the options closely.
Keith Ingram.
MAX HETHERINGTONUPDATE 14 - 18 July 2006
UPDATE 13 - 14 July 2006
UPDATE 12 - 12 July 2006
Press Release - Sanford Limited at 4:16 PM, 11 Jul 2006
Press Release - HON JIM ANDERTON 11 July 2006
UPDATE 11 - 11 July 2006
UPDATE 10 - 9 July 2006
UPDATE 9 - 6 July 2006
UPDATE 8 - 5 July 2006
UPDATE 7 - 29 June 2006
UPDATE 6 - 27 June 2006
UPDATE 5 - 26 June 2006
UPDATE 4 - 24 June 2006
UPDATE 3 - 23 June 2006
UPDATE 2 - 21 June 2006
UPDATE 1 - The Task
Kingfish bubbling from the release pipe, eager to escape. Photo: Keith Ingram Kingfish go wild