Fury as 23-million-year-old whale fossil 'stolen' from West Coast river
Tuesday, 25 October 2022
Treasured fossilised whale bones thought to be about 23 million years old have been removed from the bank of a West Coast river by a group who allegedly lied about having permission to do so.
Over Labour Weekend, two men and a woman were spotted on the shore of Little Wanganui River, about an hour and a half north of Westport, with a rock saw and chisel.
They cut the fossil from the rock, before it was taken away by boat. It is unclear whether its removal was illegal or not.
Multiple people confronted the trio with questions, but local resident Peter Lei said because it was a long weekend, their claims couldn't be checked with local authorities.
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On Tuesday, Lei and the community of Karamea were still demanding answers.
“They’ve kicked the hornet’s nest with this one … They stole from the wrong community,” he said.
“I yelled at them from across the river, asked them what they were doing,” said another local, Tom Horncastle, who confronted the group separately to Lei.
Horncastle had visited the fossil several times with his father, children and grandchildren across his 67 years, making a special trip of it as it could only be accessed during certain weather and tide conditions.
“It’s just amazing,” Horncastle said. “It’s millions of years old … It’s very special.
“I’m a rough sort of dude myself, but this is deeply troubling. It’s just wrong.”
Horncastle fetched his boat to go and talk to the trio, saying that in his gut he knew they were trying to take the local taonga.
“When we approached, they came towards us with a steel chisel, it was pretty confronting.”
Horncastle was told by one of the men that they had permission from local iwi, but according to Ngāti Waewae chairperson Francois Tumahai, that wasn’t true.
One of the men was reportedly wearing an outdated Department of Conservation shirt, which a local and former DOC worker said he recognised.
Jacob Fleming, the acting operations manager at DOC Buller, said the man had no known connection to DOC.
He said the area was located between the high- and low-tide marks, so it fell under West Coast Regional Council jurisdiction, but nonetheless a DOC ranger had been speaking to several upset locals. The council has been approached for comment.
Fleming said fossils fell under the Protected Objects Act 1975, which controls the export of such objects but not their collection or removal.
Stuff has contacted the man believed to be behind the removal of the fossil, but he has not responded to questions.
Visiting the fossil was a tradition Karamea locals had enjoyed for several generations.
Tane Franken said the removal “affected me deeply … The connection was spiritual, really.
“It’s in a place that’s not that easy to get to. If the tide is right and the weather is right, you can swim or wade across the river. It’s a real adventure when you’re a child.
“My father took me to them, and I hoped my children could take their children one day. I feel a real sense of loss that I can’t show it to my future grandchildren.”
He said although fossils could be seen in a museum, having one on your doorstep still embedded in the ground was “truly magnificent”.
“No-one owned it. It was never damaged or vandalised … Every single person who has grown up in the area treated it with respect … There was no legitimate reason [to remove it] apart from personal gain.”
Peter Lei had moved to the area four years ago and went to visit the site not long afterwards. In 2018, he contacted the University of Otago’s Professor Ewan Fordyce, who – in an email seen by Stuff – said he was familiar with the fossil.
Fordyce identified vertebrae and bones that were likely to be ribs. He couldn’t identify the type of whale with complete certainty, as the skull was not visible on the surface, but said the size was consistent with a baleen whale.
He estimated the age to be between the late Oligocene or early Miocene period – about 23 million years ago.
Lei confronted the two men who took the fossil. They refused to give their names or say who they worked for, he said.
They later claimed to have iwi permission and said they wanted to preserve the fossil, reportedly saying, “It’ll probably end up in Te Papa.”
“The guy got super aggro [and] said I was entitled for wanting it to remain. He got right up in my face. I felt very threatened.”
Lei retreated, then saw the two men bring out a rock saw. He was now kicking himself for not having done more, he said, and he had cleared his schedule to find out how to get the fossil back.
“Ideally the fossil needs to come back to the community. But if he had a right to take it … there needs to be some kind of law change.”
CORRECTION: An earlier version of the story quoted Peter Lei saying one of the men he confronted had a sharp object in his hand. That was not the case. Tom Horncastle witnessed a man with a chisel in hand. (Amended on October 25, 2022 at 6.45pm)