Whangārei Harbour is a large

harbour A harbor (American English), or harbour (Commonwealth English; see American and British English spelling differences#-our, -or, spelling differences), is a sheltered body of water where ships, boats, and barges can be Mooring, moored. The t ...

on the east coast of the

North Island The North Island ( , 'the fish of Māui', historically New Ulster) is one of the two main islands of New Zealand, islands of New Zealand, separated from the larger but less populous South Island by Cook Strait. With an area of , it is the List ...

of New Zealand. The harbour stretches from Whangārei City, and the termination of the

Hātea River The Hātea River is a river of New Zealand. It flows from the north-east of Whangārei southwards and into the northern head of Whangārei Harbour. Its lower length forms the eastern boundary of the city. The banks along the lower reaches are par ...

, south east around the

Onerahi Onerahi, for half a century known as Grahamtown, is a seaside suburb of Whangārei, New Zealand's northernmost city. It is the city's only seaside suburb. It is located 9 km south-east of the centre of Whangārei and is principally a penins ...

peninsula and out to the

Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five Borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is ...

at Whangārei Heads. Its Māori-language name (given by the ''

Ngāti Wai Iwi () are the largest social units in New Zealand Māori society. In Māori, roughly means or , and is often translated as "tribe". The word is both singular and plural in the Māori language, and is typically pluralised as such in English. ...

'' ''

iwi Iwi () are the largest social units in New Zealand Māori society. In Māori, roughly means or , and is often translated as "tribe". The word is both singular and plural in the Māori language, and is typically pluralised as such in English. ...

'' (tribe)) is ''Whangārei-te-rerenga-parāoa'', meaning "the place where

whale Whales are a widely distributed and diverse group of fully Aquatic animal, aquatic placental mammal, placental marine mammals. As an informal and Colloquialism, colloquial grouping, they correspond to large members of the infraorder Cetacea ...

s gather". Another traditional name for this area is ''Whangarei-o-te-tohorā'' – "waiting for the breastbone of whales".

History

left, The Marsden Point Oil Refinery at the entrance of Whangārei Harbour Many early settlers and Maori used the harbour as a form of transport, and this played a large role in the establishment of

Whangārei Whangārei () is the northernmost city in New Zealand and the largest settlement of the Northland Region. It is part of the Whangarei District, created in 1989 from the former Whangarei City, Whangarei County and Hikurangi Town councils to admi ...

, and many of the industries in the area. These include Portland Cement Works, Marsden Point Oil Refinery and for the extraction of coal from Kamo.
From 1911 to 1933 the Onerahi Branch Railway crossed the upper reaches of the harbour to provide rail access to a new wharf built at

, as the existing wharf in the town basin was unreachable for some craft. This further promoted the harbour as an important feature to the development of Whangārei. In 2006, two

marine reserve A marine reserve is a type of marine protected area (MPA). An MPA is a section of the ocean where a government has placed limits on human activity. A marine reserve is a marine protected area in which removing or destroying natural or cultural ...

s were opened in Whangārei Harbour. Whangarei Harbour Marine Reserve is located in an inter-tidal area between Onerahi and Waikaraka, and another around Motukaroro Island, at Reotahi, Whangārei Heads. The Motukaroro Island reserve is popular with snorkelers due to the large amount of marine life seen there.

Geography

Whangārei Harbour stretches approximately 23 km north-west from Whangārei Heads to its farthest point inland at the town basin in Whangārei central. At its widest point it is approximately 6 km wide, between Parua Bay and Takahiwai, near One Tree Point. The harbour is heavily tidal with a tidal range of approximately 2m, with much of the harbour being shallower than this in the wider parts. This means during low tide much of the harbour is

mud flats Mudflats or mud flats, also known as tidal flats or, in Ireland, slob or slobs, are coastal wetlands that form in intertidal areas where sediments have been deposited by tides or rivers. A global analysis published in 2019 suggested that tidal f ...

and exposed

sand bar In oceanography, geomorphology, and geoscience, a shoal is a natural submerged ridge, bank, or bar that consists of, or is covered by, sand or other unconsolidated material, and rises from the bed of a body of water close to the surface or ...

s. However, at the harbour entrance, where it is only around 800m wide, and between

and Matakohe Island, where it is only around 500m wide, it is up to 20m deep and currents can be strong. This allowed for the deep water Northland Port to be built at

Marsden Point Marsden Point is a broad, flat peninsula that is the southern head of the Whangārei Harbour entrance on the east coast of Northland Region, Northland, New Zealand, southeast of the city of Whangārei. It is the location of Marsden Point Oil R ...

and for the former ports at Whangārei and Onerahi to be located so far into the harbour. The main rivers flowing into the harbour are Hātea River, Mangapai River, Limeburners Creek, Raumanga Stream and Otaika Creek. They carry much sediment from surrounding farmland, creating the muddy nature of the harbour, and this requires dredging in some parts for navigation purposes. As the naming of the harbour indicates,

southern right whale The southern right whale (''Eubalaena australis'') is a baleen whale, one of three species classified as right whales belonging to the genus ''Eubalaena''. Southern right whales inhabit oceans south of the Equator, between the latitudes of 20� ...

s (''Tohora'') and possibly other coastal species like humpback and

Bryde's whale Bryde's whale ( ), or the Bryde's whale complex, putatively comprises three species of rorqual and possibly four. The "complex" means the number and classification remain unclear because of a lack of definitive information and research. The c ...

s used to gather in the harbour historically, but today it is not often to see

baleen whale Baleen whales (), also known as whalebone whales, are marine mammals of the order (biology), parvorder Mysticeti in the infraorder Cetacea (whales, dolphins and porpoises), which use baleen plates (or "whalebone") in their mouths to sieve plankt ...

s in the harbour due to their small population sizes and slow recoveries caused by commercial whaling by Europeans and Maoris (a whaling station was situated in the harbour), and illegal mass whaling operations by Soviet Union with supports by Japan (it is said that if these illegal operations had not taken place, the numbers of whales in New Zealand would have been three to four times larger than those of today). The first documented return of the southern right whales into the harbour was in 2002. Smaller

cetacean Cetacea (; , ) is an infraorder of aquatic mammals belonging to the order Artiodactyla that includes whales, dolphins and porpoises. Key characteristics are their fully aquatic lifestyle, streamlined body shape, often large size and exclusively c ...

s such as

dolphin A dolphin is an aquatic mammal in the cetacean clade Odontoceti (toothed whale). Dolphins belong to the families Delphinidae (the oceanic dolphins), Platanistidae (the Indian river dolphins), Iniidae (the New World river dolphins), Pontopori ...

s and

killer whale The orca (''Orcinus orca''), or killer whale, is a toothed whale and the largest member of the oceanic dolphin family. The only extant species in the genus '' Orcinus'', it is recognizable by its black-and-white-patterned body. A cosmopolit ...

s (orcas) can be observed in the harbour more frequently. File:View of Whangarei showing part of the town, Hatea River, and the SS Kanieri berthed at the town wharf. ATLIB 287807.png, Whangārei Town Wharf, 1911 File:Railway bridge over the Hatea River at Port Whangarei, 1923. ATLIB 293701.png, Railway bridge over the Hatea River at Port Whangārei in 1923

References

{{Reflist Ports and harbours of New Zealand Whangārei Whangarei District