Overview
Black smelt, along with other marine smelt, are small fish integral to food webs in the sea. Despite this importance, the marine smelt in New Zealand have been poorly understood. Te Papa’s Andrew Stewart, working with a South African colleague, has recognised nine new species for New Zealand. Two are new to science, and seven have not been recorded in New Zealand before.
Smelts remain in deep water during the day to avoid predators. At night, they move upwards to eat animal plankton that has been feeding on plant plankton near the sun-lit surface. They are not commercially fished, but nutrients they consume make their way to our plates when we eat predators such as hoki.
Black smelt are classified in the genus Bathylagichthys. There are five species of Bathylagichthys in New Zealand waters. They are usually caught at depths of 15-320 m, over a bottom depth range of 800-4700 m.
These marine-dwelling smelt (family Bathylagidae) are not closely related to the New Zealand freshwater fishes also called smelt (family Retropinnidae).
Note: Te Papa’s collections of marine smelt are not yet online.