Otago Harbour is the natural harbour of Dunedin, New Zealand, consisting of a long, much-indented stretch of generally navigable water separating the Otago Peninsula from the mainland. The peninsula joins the mainland at its southwest end, from the harbour mouth. The harbour is home to Dunedin's two port facilities, Port Chalmers (half way along the harbour) and at Dunedin's wharf (at the harbour's end). The harbour has been of significant economic importance for approximately 700 years, as a sheltered harbour and fishery, then deep water port. Geologically, the harbour was formed from the drowned remnants of the Dunedin Volcano.
Geography The harbour was formed from the drowned remnants of the giant Dunedin Volcano, centred close to what is now Port Chalmers. Remains of this origin can be seen in the basalt of the surrounding hills. The last eruptive phase ended some ten million years ago, leaving the prominent peak of Mount Cargill.Coombs, D. S., Dunedin Volcano, Misc. Publ. 37B, pp. 2–28, Geol. Soc. of N. Z., Dunedin, 1987.Coombs, D. S., R. A. Cas, Y. Kawachi, C. A. Landis, W. F. Mc-Donough, and A. Reay, Cenozoic volcanism in north, east and central Otago, Bull. R. Soc. N. Z., 23, 278–312, 1986. A channel runs along the western side of the harbour, the eastern side being shallow, with large sandbanks exposed at low tide. Two islands form a line between Port Chalmers and Portobello half way along the harbour—Goat Island / Rakiriri and Quarantine Island / Kamau Taurua. The nearby smaller island known as Puddingstone or Pudding Island (Titeremoana) lies close to the Peninsula shore and can be reached by foot at low tide. The Water of Leith flows into the harbour at its southern end, lowering the salinity of the harbour water there, along with numerous streams.
The harbour's edge is dotted with bays, among them Deborah Bay, Careys Bay, Sawyers Bay, and Blanket Bay on the northwestern shore and Macandrew Bay, Company Bay, Turnbulls Bay, Edwards Bay, Broad Bay, Latham Bay, and Portobello Bay on the peninsula shore.
Biology
Seabirds
Like the Otago Peninsula, the harbour itself is known for its rare wildlife. The area is the home of many species of wading birds, as well as two penguin species: the blue penguin and the rare yellow-eyed penguin. Taiaroa Head, at the tip of the Otago Peninsula, is home to the only "mainland" colony of northern royal albatrosses in the world.
Marine mammals
The bay and peninsula provides a critical habitat for Hooker's sea lions and New Zealand fur seals. Southern elephant and leopard seals are occasional visitors into the harbour. In total, four species of pinnipeds, and at least nine or more species of cetaceans are known to inhabit or migrate through the area.
The outer peninsula adjacent to Taiaroa Head is one of three main congregating areas for dusky dolphins in New Zealand watersLineage—Scientific Methodology—Annual distribution of Dusky dolphin . Retrieved on 16 December. 2014 and the harbour and peninsula hosts important areas for breeding and nursing.Würsig B.. Duprey N.. Weir J.. Dusky dolphins (Lagenorhynchus obscurus) in New Zealand waters—Present knowledge and research goals. Texas A&M University. Department of Conservation. Retrieved on 16 December. 2014 Bottlenose dolphins and critically endangered, endemic Hector's dolphins also frequent the water. Common dolphins and orcas also visit the harbour entrance, where orcas and dusky dolphins have been seen interacting without violence. Southern right whales were historically seen inside the entrance of the harbour, possibly up to Quarantine and Goat Island / Rakiriri. They used the shallow, calm water for nursing calves before commercial whaling wiped them out locally. The number of humpback whales visiting the peninsula has increased, as this species recovers much faster than the southern rights.Monarch Wildlife Cruises. 2014. Whale of a time on Monarch yesterday!. Retrieved on 4 August 2014 Blue whales, minke whales, and long-finned pilot whales have also been observed.
History
Māori first arrived at Otago Harbour in the 1300s, soon after they reached New Zealand. Being too far south for the cultivation of kūmara they adopted a hunter-gatherer society. This initially involved sealing and fishing in the harbour, with the latter dominating as seal stocks diminished. This time in the harbour's history is recorded in place names such as Kamau Taurua (Quarantine Island), which means "a place where nets are set".
The first European ships
Captain Cook never entered Otago Harbour, but he speculated that it existed when he was off the Pacific coast in 1770.James Cook in J.C. Beaglehole (ed), The Journals of Captain James Cook, the Voyage of the Endeavour, 1768–1771, London, UK: Cambridge University Press for the Hakluyt Society, 1955, (1968), pp.257–259. It is not known exactly when the first Europeans (likely sealers) entered the harbour, though Māori oral tradition puts it some time 'long before' 1810.Quote from the Creed MS its text reproduced in Peter Entwisle,Taka: a Vignette Life of William Tucker 1784–1817, Dunedin, NZ: Port Daniel Press, 2005, pp.128–131, the quote at p.128. Written records of this time are restricted to a handful of journals and newspaper accounts of sailors who only stayed briefly. George Bass made the Dunedin end of the harbour the north east limit of his proposed fishing monopoly in 1803.Robert McNab (ed) Historical Records of New Zealand, 2 vols Wellington, NZ:Government Printer, 1908 & 1914. The American ship Favourite and its supercargo Daniel Whitney may have called in the summer of 1805 to 1806. Daniel Cooper, master of the London sealer Unity, probably did visit in the summer of 1808 to 1809 as it is thought his Chief Officer, Charles Hooper, gave his name to Hooper's Inlet on the Otago Peninsula.Peter Entwisle, Behold the Moon: the European Occupation of the Dunedin District 1770–1848, Dunedin, NZ: Port Daniel Press, 1998 p.21. The first explicit and identifiable reference to a European ship in Otago Harbour is in 1810. William Tucker (1784–1817) was with a gang employed by Robert Campbell, a Sydney merchant, who were dropped on islands off the Dunedin coast in November 1809. Tucker and Daniel Wilson were at Otago Harbour on 3 May 1810 when Robert Mason, master of the Brothers, anchored in the harbour and picked him up. The court record mentioning this, written in 1810, refers to the harbour as 'Port Daniel', a name which stayed in use for some years.Peter Entwisle, Taka: A Vignette Life of William Tucker 1784–1817, Dunedin, NZ: Port Daniel Press, 2005, pp.53–66 & pp.110–115 for the relevant court records.
The sealers and whalers
Another English sealer, the Sydney Cove, under Captain Charles McLaren, was anchored in the harbour late in 1810 when Te Wahia's theft of a knife, a red shirt, and some other articles sparked what has been called "The Sealers' War".Peter Entwisle, Taka: a Vignette Life of William Tucker 1784–1817, Dunedin, NZ: Port Daniel Press, 2005, pp.70–71.
James Kelly of Hobart anchored the Sophia in the harbour in December 1817 with William Tucker on board. They visited nearby Whareakeake, where Tucker had been living since 1815, and Tucker and two other men were killed by Māori. Kelly and his men proceeded to kill large numbers of Māori, including a local chief named Korako. He then burnt a harbourside village, 'the beautiful City of Otago', probably on Te Rauone Beach.Peter Entwisle, Taka: a Vignette Life of William Tucker 1784–1817, Dunedin, NZ: Port Daniel Press, 2005, pp.94–97, quoting James Kelly in the Hobart Town Courier 12 April 1858. There has been some speculation, almost certainly inaccurate, that the site of the "city" was at Whareakeake.
Peace was achieved in 1823, and on 17 July of that year John Rodolphus Kent of the naval cutter Mermaid from New South Wales, while in the harbour, took 'the liberty of naming it (as it has not hitherto been named) "Port Oxley", in honour of the Surveyor General of the Colony', John Oxley (1783/85?–1828).John Rodolphus Kent, Journal kept from May to August 1823 on the cutter Mermaid of a voyage to New Zealand waters, manuscript ZA4037, Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales, Sydney. As noted, however, it had already been named by both Māori and English colonisers. In 1826 Thomas Shepherd, one of a party of intending colonists, explored the site of Dunedin and left the oldest surviving pictures of the harbour and nearby coast, now in the Mitchell Library in Sydney.Thomas Shepherd, [Journal], MS A1966, Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales, Sydney.
From its origins as a secret sealers' haven, Otago Harbour developed into a busy international whaling port after the Weller brothers established their whaling station at Te Umu Kuri, Wellers Rock, at what is now called Ōtākou in November 1831.Peter Entwisle, Behold the Moon: The European Occupation of the Dunedin District 1770–1848, Dunedin, NZ: Port Daniel Press, 1998, p.83. The busiest whaling port south of the Bay of Islands, it was also the hub of the largest European population in New Zealand after the Bay of Islands/Hokianga district by the end of 1839. By then whaling had collapsed, and Dumont D'Urville and his officers, visiting in 1840, observed that the port had become the centre of a riotous trade in liquor and prostitution.Olive Wright, ed & translator, The Voyage of the Astrolabe 1840, Wellington, NZ: A.H. & A.W. Reed, 1955. This continued until the Scottish settlers arrived in 1848 and made Port Chalmers and Dunedin the new population centres on the harbour.
Harbour developments and alterations
While Otago Harbour might have the appearance of an excellent deep-water port, it was not naturally suited to such a role, especially in the early days of settlement when ships needed to dock close to the city. The flat land at the southern end of the harbour and close to the isthmus of Otago Peninsula was ideally suited for a city (and was the site for Dunedin), but the harbour itself could naturally accommodate deep-drafted ships only as far as Port Chalmers. At Port Chalmers, two islands (Quarantine Island / Kamau Taurua and Goat Island / Rakiriri) almost bisect the harbour. Beyond them, the harbour is shallow and silty, and mudflats are often visible at low tide.McLean, G. (2002) 100 Historic Places in New Zealand. Auckland: Hodder Moa Beckett. pp. 115–116. In 1946 Otakou Fisheries was started based out of the township of the same name on the eastern side of the harbour. This was later to become a major part of the Otago fishing industry.
As the city grew, and particularly with the increase in commerce that developed following the Otago gold rush of the 1860s, it became desirable to provide a means for ships to reach the city's wharves. Though a contentious and expensive decision, it was agreed to dredge a channel along the northwestern side of the harbour. The channel was finally opened on 30 December 1881. The initial channel was narrow and shallow, and did not get off to an auspicious start, as the Union Steam Ship Company's SS Penguin, the first ship to use it, was temporarily grounded while using it. The channel was officially named the Victoria Channel by Keith Ramsay, chairman of the Otago Harbour Board. A significant area at the head of the harbour — much of it referred to as the Southern Endowment — has been reclaimed since the founding of Dunedin, primarily for industrial use. Smaller portions have also been reclaimed at a number of places around the harbour, including Port Chalmers, Macandrew Bay, and Broad Bay.