Water Ways Consulting

Water Ways Consulting Water Ways Consulting is a freshwater ecological consulting company based in Dunedin, New Zealand.

We spent the weekend in the Wilberforce catchment. A significant reach of the river has no surface flow during lower fl...
09/03/2026

We spent the weekend in the Wilberforce catchment. A significant reach of the river has no surface flow during lower flow periods. We did a 2.5 km walk across the riverbed without finding a flowing channel. We did find a remnant pool with a few little alpine galaxiids waiting for flow to return

01/03/2026

A collection of dusky galaxiids going back in the water. Some in no hurry to go anywhere.

One tricky fish identification can be distinguishing between small koaro and small non-migratory galaxiids. The photos ...
23/02/2026

One tricky fish identification can be distinguishing between small koaro and small non-migratory galaxiids. The photos below are of a post-whitebait stage koaro and a dwarf galaxiid caught together in the Wairau catchment. The koaro still has its whitebait stage forked tail, that it looses as it grows compared with the almost flat ended tail of the dwarf galaxiid. The koaro also has 16 segmented fin rays and the dwarf 14. When viewed from above the colour patterns are very different (not always the case so needs some caution), but the koaro shows its pectoral and pelvic fins whereas they much more hidden on the dwarf galaxiid

29/01/2026

This is 125 banded kokopu that we caught in just one Gee minnow trap this morning. A second trap had 131 more. It took a fair while to measure them all

In Fiordland today doing some eDNA sampling. Trying to get work done when it’s not raining
24/01/2026

In Fiordland today doing some eDNA sampling. Trying to get work done when it’s not raining

Today we found an upland bully spawning site. Upland bully females batch spawn and can lay eggs several times during sp...
21/12/2025

Today we found an upland bully spawning site. Upland bully females batch spawn and can lay eggs several times during spring and summer. Here on this rock is a large area with hatched out eggs with just the egg membranes left (left and center of photo), a batch of well developed eggs (golden coloured, center of photo) and some more recently laid paler eggs to the right. And at the bottom of the photo there are more eggs.

Yesterday we caught a suspiciously fat dusky galaxiid in a Gee minnow trap. It well past spawning time so it’s not a rip...
11/12/2025

Yesterday we caught a suspiciously fat dusky galaxiid in a Gee minnow trap. It well past spawning time so it’s not a ripe female. Possibly a small koura did not survive also being in the trap.

A couple of different critters along the a Central Otago stream, both unusually hanging around long enough to get closeu...
20/11/2025

A couple of different critters along the a Central Otago stream, both unusually hanging around long enough to get closeup pics

This little female upland bully needs to spawn or she will burst. Or maybe it’s her impression of a puffer fish
18/09/2025

This little female upland bully needs to spawn or she will burst. Or maybe it’s her impression of a puffer fish

One last post from the mudfish work. I took a couple of photos of a mudfish on the stream bed after I released it from t...
09/09/2025

One last post from the mudfish work. I took a couple of photos of a mudfish on the stream bed after I released it from the trap. Checking one zoomed in photo today you can see mudfish eggs on the streambed to the left of the fish. This ranks up there as one of the luckiest photos I ever taken

The stock water race and a close up picture of Canterbury mudfish and a male upland bully
08/09/2025

The stock water race and a close up picture of Canterbury mudfish and a male upland bully

Address

Dunedin

Opening Hours

Monday 8:30am - 5pm
Tuesday 8:30am - 5pm
Wednesday 8:30am - 5pm
Thursday 8:30am - 5pm
Friday 8:30am - 5pm
Saturday 8:30am - 5pm

Telephone

+6421904950

Website

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