The most common of the five species that make up the whitebait catch. It is a fish that starts as a glass sliver and ends as a fritter. The transformation is stark. In their juvenile stage, the one that ends up in the frying pan, they are tiny translucent glass fish about 50mm long. If they manage to dodge the nets and hungry trout, they grow into sleek olive-gold adults. These adults look like a cross between a minnow and a trout. They are part of the galaxiid family, named because the shimmering spots on their backs look like a galaxy of stars. Unlike many fish, they lack scales. This gives them a smooth leathery feel that makes them incredibly agile in the fast-flowing white water of the rapids. It is a masterpiece of tidal timing. In autumn, adults swim downstream to estuaries during a spring tide, the highest tides of the month. They lay eggs in the damp base of grasses and rushes on the riverbank, right at the high-water mark. The tide recedes, leaving eggs high and dry in humid grass for two weeks. When the next spring tide arrives and floods the banks, the eggs hatch instantly. Larvae are washed out to sea. They spend six months in the Pacific Ocean before running back into rivers in spring. This is when the madness of whitebaiting season begins. The tragedy of the īnanga is that we are literally mowing down their nurseries. Because they lay eggs in long grass on river edges, wandering livestock and over-zealous council lawnmowers are their greatest threat. If grass is eaten or cut, eggs dry out and die. The loss is silent. The little fish that could. The river is high. The whitebait run, translucent glass slivers, dodging nets, dodging trout. The net sweeps. The whitebait are caught. They become fritters. They do not know they are a delicacy. They do not know their nurseries are being mowed. They just want to go home. A translucent traveller that links the deep ocean to backyard streams. The whitebait is proof. It carries on.