Imagine if there were only 110 kiwis left in the wild. That’s
how many Maui’s dolphins there are believed to be. Now
critically endangered, they are found only on the west coast of
the North Island. And studies estimate that while there were
26,000 Hectors dolphins living around New Zealand in the 1970s,
only about 7,000, or less than a third, remain. The biggest
threat to Hector’s and Maui’s dolphins is the use of set nets
and trawler fishing. A 2008 report by the National Institute of
Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) estimated that 110 to 150
Hector’s and Maui’s dolphins die in commercial set nets every
year. To help prevent this the government imposed a variety of
regional bans and other restrictions on set netting, trawling
and drift netting in coastal waters in 2008. Recently,
conservationists have called for the extension of the ban in
Taranaki after what is believed to be a Maui’s dolphin was
killed by a set net there in January. There are also fears the
current government has undermined the prote