Once in the air, they live only a day or two, to mate and procreate, to die and to fall back into the water. “Life in the stream is so prolific,” says photographer George Novak, “that when you turn over a rock you’ll see tens of mayfly nymphs scuttling away.” Consequently the stream receives the highest possible score in the Macroinvertebrate Community Index-an ideal habitat for both mayflies and trout, and the quintessence of the oft-touted ‘100% Pure NZ’ slogan. Spring-fed from the Mamakau Plateau, the upper reaches of the Waihou River (formerly the Thames River) are internationally recognised for water quality and supply nearly 70 per cent of New Zealand’s bottled water. Then they fly off, keeping their bodies vertical in flight, tails trailing like long legs, giving an overall impression of dainty ballerinas carried on gossamer wings. There, they struggle through the viscous membrane that separates the two worlds and climb out of their nymphal shucks-think of a whitewater kayaker, adrift in a current, pulling herself out of a tight cockpit. Then, when conditions are right, they ascend to the surface to hatch. Mayflies spend almost all of their lives underwater among rocks on a streambed usually a year, sometimes two in the case of the largest species. The mass emergence of mayflies attracts trout, which I had come here to fly-fish, but such was the explosive beauty of the spectacle before me, I put my rod away and just watched. Each insect rose from a dimple on the water’s surface, then took a hyperbolic flight path, vanishing into the glowing Southland sky. Written by Derek Grzelewski Photographed by George NovakĪt dusk, on the upper Waiau River under the swingbridge entrance to the Kepler Track, the mayflies were hatching.
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