Hunters and Gathers

"There's been a long tradition of hunting and gathering here," says the Ūpoko of Te Rūnanga o Makaawhio, Wilfred Te Koeti.

"I don't hunt myself, but there are plenty of deer coming back for those who do – and goats have gone wild so they're plentiful, too. But we've always had plenty to eat here."

Uncle Wilfred sidles into the big kitchen to check on Jason Dell's progress. He looks satisfied.

"Why would you bring food here?" he asks.

"Everything you could ever need is right here – fish, game, birds. We've always done well here."

Uncle Wilfred has always had a tie to Bruce Bay. Like his mother before him, he was born there. Although he now lives in Christchurch, he and his wife, Joy still visit and maintain the old Bruce Bay bach his father built.

"It's not just the mahinga kai that brings us back, though. It's the aroha. It's the bonds we have with the land that go right back to the old pā site at Makaawhio River."

"Why would you bring food here? Everything you could ever need is right here – fish, game, birds. We've always done well here."

Wilfred Te Koeti

Makaawhio River is now commonly known as Jacob's River, after a Kāti Māhaki ancestor, Hakopa Kaapo who paddled early Europeans across the river before the road was built. "They named him Jacob, hence Jacob's River," says Uncle Wilfred.

Back in the kitchen, Jason has seconded Waikōhatu Scott to help. Wearing a bright green apron, she's making whitebait fritters – the entrée. It's an appropriate choice given that mata (whitebait) have traditionally been just as popular on this part of the coast as they have been further north at Arahura.

Local resident Paul Wilson has been catching them for as long as he can remember. He and his brother built net frames from kahikatea saplings, or supplejack, and attached scrim or wire gauze for the net itself. He still goes whitebaiting, but confesses he now uses ready-made aluminium nets.

Seated, left to right: Paul Wilson, Marie Wilson, Ken Holliday, Joy Te Koeti, Wilfred Te Koeti, Susan Wallace, Karera Wallace-Jones, Wai Scott, Paul Madgwick, Maria Russell, Charlotte Russell, Mata Holliday, Jason Dell.

Paul lives at nearby Hunts Beach and apart from eight years in the North Island, has lived there since he was born. Hunting and gathering has always been a solid family tradition. As boys, he and his brother helped their father gather mussels, pipi, cockles and pāua at Hunts Beach.

"Our job was to gather the shellfish off the rocks and put them into rock pools. My dad would then shell them into a kono (woven basket), and as soon as that was full, we'd go home. We also hunted for seagull eggs when we were kids. We'd boil them up in a tin on a beach fire and have a great feed."

He started deer hunting when he was ten. "We're lean and mean down here," he says with a laugh, "so we've always spent a lot of time hunting and gathering. I was still at primary school when I shot my first deer. I don't know who got the bigger fright – me or the deer."

Paul and his brother hunted with their father in the Paringa area, especially during the

1950s and 1960s, before the road from Haast to Wānaka was completed.

"You never got many red deer north of Paringa," says Paul. "There were a few at the head of Jacob's River – and they're still there – but generally there are a lot more deer around these days, mostly because deer hunters and helicopters have pushed them into new territories."

Deer were first released into the Rākaia region as game animals in the early 1900s. They gradually made their way across the Southern Alps to the West Coast and within 30 years were declared a major pest. Today, says Paul, there are plenty more hunters around to keep the numbers down.

Despite a long hunting history, Paul admits he'd rather eat venison than hunt it. He has some good tips for its preparation.

"Once it's been shot, deer should be hung for three to five days. We always cut the animal into joints – with the skin left on – and hung them in trees with plenty of ground clearance. The wind dried the exposed flesh very efficiently and blowflies or insects could not penetrate the outer crust that formed.

"The meat was always very tender, and we loved it best when it had been made into a campoven venison stew or fried up with onions."

He says the taste of venison always depends on what the animals had been eating and on their age.

Baked enchilada of wild venison.

"We only ever took the two-year-old spikers – you wouldn't even bother to shoot anything older – and we usually went out early in the morning or in the early evening. Deer are night feeders. They hide during daylight hours and creep out at night to eat the grass on the edge of the bush."

With tempting aromas wafting from the kitchen, we pause to watch Susan Wallace weaving putiputi harakeke (flax flowers) for the table setting. Tamariki are playing in one corner; kaumātua are chatting in another; and chef Jason Dell is putting the finishing touches to the eagerly-awaited lunch.

Uncle Wilfred is right. There is a palpable feeling of aroha in the air, and with soft drizzle falling over the dense Westland bush outside, whitebait fritters and venison steaks seem the only logical conclusion to a well-spent day.

Hunters and Gathers

Hunters and Gathers

Wildwest Venison

Inside Issue 43

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