Can You Use a Cast Net for Bait at Cape Brett? The Rules, Zone by Zone

Short answer: no. You cannot use a cast net — or any other net — to catch bait inside the Cape Brett, Bird Rock or Ninepin zones in the Bay of Islands. It is a flat prohibition under regulation 75 of the Fisheries (Amateur Fishing) Regulations 2013, it covers every kind of net including a hand-thrown cast net, and it carries a fine of up to $10,000. Here is exactly where the lines are, what the wording actually says, and where you can legally fill the bait tank instead.

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Every summer we get the same phone call from someone heading up to the Bay of Islands for a few days on the boat. They have a cast net in the locker, they have heard the piper school up thick around the rocks off Cape Brett, and they want to know whether they can throw it. The answer surprises a lot of experienced fishers, because Cape Brett is one of a small handful of places in New Zealand where the rule is not about mesh size or bag limits at all. It is simply: no nets.

This guide walks through the actual law rather than the campground version of it. We have quoted the regulations directly, listed the coordinates that define each closed zone, and then set out the general national bait-net rules that apply once you are back outside the closed water. We sell these nets for a living, and we would much rather you understood the rules than lost the net and the boat trip to a fisheries officer.

This article is a plain-English guide, not legal advice, and it is current as at September 2026. Rules change. Always check the Fisheries New Zealand rules before you fish — the free NZ Fishing Rules app and the Fisheries New Zealand rules pages are the authoritative source on the day.

1. The rule that stops you: regulation 75

The relevant law is the Fisheries (Amateur Fishing) Regulations 2013. Regulation 75 is headed "Restrictions on use of certain fishing gear in Bay of Islands" and subclause (1) reads:

"A person must not use a net for fishing in any of the following waters: (a) Bird Rock: (b) Cape Brett: (c) Ninepin."

Subclause (4) of the same regulation makes a breach an offence carrying a fine of up to $10,000.

Two words in that sentence do all the work.

"A net." The regulations define a net, in the interpretation section, as "any net or part of a net that is used or capable of being used to take fish", excluding only a bob, a ring pot and a whitebait net. A cast net is unquestionably a net. So is a bait net, a drag net, a set net, a fyke net and a scoop net used to take fish. There is no carve-out for small mesh, for bait, or for the fact that you are only throwing it by hand from the rocks. If it is a net and you are using it to take fish inside those waters, you are offending.

"For fishing." This is a use prohibition, not a possession prohibition. You are not committing an offence under regulation 75 simply by having a cast net stowed in the boat as you motor past Cape Brett — the offence is using it. That said, regulation 49 makes it an offence to possess fish in conjunction with an unlawful net, and a net that is wet, out and in your hands is very hard to argue about. Keep it dry and stowed inside the closed zones.

Worth noting for anyone who has been told "you can still net for mullet there": regulation 75 has a grey-mullet-and-flatfish exemption, but it applies only to subclause (2), the seasonal set net and set line closure inside the Bay of Islands proper. It does not apply to the total net ban at Bird Rock, Cape Brett and Ninepin. Those three zones are all-net, all-species, all-year.

2. Exactly where the closed zones are

This is the part most summaries leave out, and it is the part that decides whether you are legal. Each of the three zones is defined in Schedule 14 of the regulations as a 1 nautical mile radius — roughly 1.85 km — around a fixed point:

• Cape Brett — all waters within 1 nautical mile of the northernmost point of Cape Brett, at 35°10.45′S, 174°20.05′E. That circle takes in the lighthouse point, the Hole in the Rock end of Piercy Island (Motukōkako) and the deep water immediately off the cape.
• Bird Rock — all waters within 1 nautical mile of the mean high-water mark of Bird Rock, at 35°9.92′S, 174°18.35′E, just north-west of the cape.
• Ninepin — all waters within 1 nautical mile of the mean high-water mark of Ninepin, at 35°09.25′S, 174°08.75′E, off the northern side of the bay near Cape Wiwiki.

A nautical mile is a long way in a small boat. From the tip of Cape Brett, one mile covers essentially all of the reef, pinnacle and rock-face water that anyone would want to net bait over. If you are within sight of the lighthouse and casting at a school working the wash, assume you are inside the circle. The safe practical approach is to plot those three positions on the plotter with a 1 nm ring around each before you leave the ramp.

3. The second layer: the Rākaumangamanga rāhui tapu (no-take area)

Regulation 75 is only the fisheries-law layer. There is a second, entirely separate layer of protection on Cape Brett's doorstep, and it is stricter still.

Following an Environment Court decision finalised in May 2023 and adopted into the Northland Regional Plan on 31 July 2023, two marine protection areas — rāhui tapu — were created on the Northland coast. The one that matters here is the Rākaumangamanga Rāhui Tapu, which runs from Maunganui Bay (Deep Water Cove) to Opourua (Oke Bay) in the Bay of Islands. Inside it, no fishing or diving for seafood of any kind is permitted — not by net, not by line, not by hand. Taking bait is taking marine life, so it is out too. The stated exceptions are kina harvest and activities associated with restoration, research and tikanga such as customary fishing. The other area, the Mimiwhangata Rāhui Tapu around the Mimiwhangata peninsula, has the same no-take status further south. See the Northland Regional Council marine protection areas page.

These are not decorative rules. In November 2024 the council served an abatement notice on a commercial fishing boat caught inside the Rākaumangamanga boundaries, and it now runs warranted-officer patrols with local hapū on most days over the summer holiday period. Because the rāhui tapu sit under the Resource Management Act rather than the Fisheries Act, the enforcement tools and penalties are different again from the $10,000 fisheries fine.

There is also a third, commercial-facing layer: bulk harvesting methods — bottom trawling, bottom pair trawling, Danish seining and purse seining — are prohibited in a wider area around Rākaumangamanga (Cape Brett) out to roughly the 100 metre depth contour, running from just north of Maunganui Bay, around the cape and south of Whangamumu Harbour, to just north of Te Akau (Elliott Bay). That one does not affect a recreational fisher with a cast net, but it tells you how seriously this stretch of coast is being managed.

One caveat we should flag, because it was in the news in August 2026: the Government's Planning Bill and Natural Environment Bill propose removing regional councils' ability to make rules about fishing, on the basis that fisheries management belongs solely with Fisheries New Zealand. The Minister's office has confirmed the Mimiwhangata and Rākaumangamanga protections will not automatically be carried across into the new planning system expected in 2030. Until then the rāhui tapu rules stand and are being enforced. Do not treat a headline about future reform as permission to fish there now.

4. The seasonal set net closure across the wider Bay of Islands

Move away from the three no-net circles and you are into the Bay of Islands set net and set line closure area, defined in Schedule 14 by a line running from Tapeka Point out past Motuarohia (Roberton) Island, the islet north-west of Moturua Island, Okahu (Red Head) Island, and on to Kohangaatara Point on the eastern side of the Albert Channel.

Inside that area, under regulation 75(2), you must not use or possess a set net or a set line for fishing during the closed season — commonly published as 1 October to 30 April. Regulation 75(3) exempts nets used to target grey mullet or flatfish from that seasonal closure. Note the difference from the Cape Brett rule: this one is about set nets and set lines, it is seasonal, and it has an exemption. It is why so many people muddle the two.

Separately, there is a year-round set net prohibition at three more Bay of Islands landmarks — Cape Wiwiki, Whale Rock and Twins Rock — which form part of the wider Auckland and Kermadec set net prohibition area (the same schedule also lists the Three Kings, Hen and Chickens, Mokohinau Islands and others). Cape Wiwiki, for example, is defined as the waters within 1 nautical mile of its easternmost point at 35°09.42′S, 174°07.70′E. Set netting there is banned outright; cast netting for bait is not caught by that particular prohibition, but Ninepin's total net ban sits right next door, so know which circle you are in.

5. The national bait net rules — what applies everywhere else

Once you are clear of the closed zones, the general gear rules in the Fisheries (Amateur Fishing) Regulations 2013 apply. These are the ones fisheries officers check most often.

One net, and one extra for bait

Regulation 34 sets the set net rules: no set net longer than 60 metres, no more than one set net, no baited set nets (except fyke nets), and no net set within 60 metres of another net. Regulation 34(3) says a person on board a vessel must not use a set net if there is more than one set net on board.

Regulation 34(4) is the bait-net concession everyone quotes: a vessel may carry and use two set nets if one of them has a mesh size of less than 50 mm and does not exceed 10 metres in length. That is the whole of the "extra bait net" allowance — under 10 m, under 50 mm mesh. Anything longer or coarser counts as your one and only set net.

Drag nets

Regulation 35: a drag net must not exceed 40 metres in length, total warp length must not exceed 200 metres, and you may not use or possess more than one drag net at a time.

The rules that catch people out

• Mark your net. Nets must carry the fisher's initials and surname, clearly, legibly and permanently, on a surface float at each end (one float for fyke nets). A phone number is a good idea too.
• Hand hauling only. Nets must be hauled by hand — no winches, no vehicles.
• No stalling. You must not use a net in a way that causes fish to be stranded by a falling tide.
• Channels. A net, alone or together with any other net, must not extend more than one quarter of the way across a river, stream or channel.
• No baited nets (fyke nets excepted), and no stakes or poles used in conjunction with a net.

Minimum mesh sizes — the real cast net question

There is no regulation that says "cast nets are illegal in New Zealand". What the regulations do instead is set a minimum net mesh size per species in Schedule 3, and those minimums apply to the net you are using regardless of what you call it. For the Auckland/Kermadec area the key figures are:

This is why we only sell and recommend 1 inch (25 mm) mesh cast nets for New Zealand use. A 25 mm cast net meets the minimum for the small baitfish it is designed to catch — piper, yellow-eyed mullet, herring, sprats, pilchards. Anything finer than 25 mm does not meet the minimum for any species you would realistically target with it, and a ¾ inch or ½ inch net is not a net to use in New Zealand waters. We stock those sizes for export markets only.

The flip side matters too: a 25 mm cast net is not legal gear for grey mullet (85 mm minimum) or kahawai (85 mm) or flounder (100 mm). If those are the target, you need a proper set or drag net in the right mesh — not a bait net.

Baitfish daily limit

In the Auckland and Kermadec area the daily limit for baitfish is 50 fish per person, combined across anchovy, jack/horse/Chilean mackerel, koheru/scad, pilchard, piper/garfish, slender and stout sprat and yellow-eyed mullet, with no minimum length. That limit sits on top of the 20-fish combined finfish daily limit; it is not part of it. Fisheries New Zealand has consulted on splitting piper/garfish and yellow-eyed mullet out into their own species-specific limits of up to 20 per person in FMA 1 and 9, on the back of declining catch trends and reports of localised depletion — so this is a number worth re-checking each season.

6. So where can you actually get bait in the Bay of Islands?

Practically, the answer is: away from the three no-net circles, outside the rāhui tapu, and preferably inside the sheltered water rather than on the exposed rock faces where the protections are concentrated.

• Use a jig, not a net, at the cape. A set of small sabiki-style bait flies will fill a tank with koheru, mackerel and piper anywhere in the bay, including inside the no-net zones, because a line with hooks is not a net. Line-fishing rules still apply, and remember the rāhui tapu bans all fishing methods.
• Net in the sheltered inner bay, well clear of the closure lines, and watch the seasonal set net closure between 1 October and 30 April.
• Buy your bait and skip the argument. On a short trip, the risk-to-reward on a $10,000 fine is not close.
• Plot the boundaries before you go. Three 1 nm rings and the Deep Water Cove to Oke Bay line on the plotter takes five minutes and settles every debate on the boat.

7. Choosing the right net — once you are in legal water

For anyone building a bait set-up for Northland, this is what we would put in the boat:

• 6FT x 1 inch American-style cast net, 4-ply brown — the easy starting point for one person off a wharf or the rocks.
• 8FT USA-style cast net, 1 inch green nylon — fast sinking, the best all-round size for most people.
• 10FT radius 1 inch white cast net and the 12FT radius 1 inch white cast net — more coverage for experienced throwers.
• 6FT Japanese-style 1 inch cast net — a different throwing action, popular with anglers who learned on this style.
• AFP-11 10 m mono piper bait net, 25 mm — the one that fits regulation 34(4)'s extra-bait-net allowance exactly: under 10 m, under 50 mm mesh.
• 6-ply green piper drag nets, 25 mm and the longer AFP-12 to AFP-17 mono piper bait nets from 20 m to 100 m — for serious bait gathering where netting is permitted.

All of our piper and bait nets are made here in Auckland, and we can build to a length and mesh you specify. If you are unsure which net is legal for the species and the area you fish, ask us before you buy — we would rather spend ten minutes on the phone than have you buy the wrong thing.

6FT x 1 inch AM-style cast net, 4-ply brown $99.99

8FT USA-style cast net, 1 inch green $135

10FT radius 1 inch white cast net $175

12FT radius 1 inch white cast net $220

6FT Japanese-style 1 inch cast net $99.99

AFP-11 10 m mono piper bait net, 25 mm $115

6-ply green piper drag net, 25 mm $115

Quick reference

Sources

• Fisheries (Amateur Fishing) Regulations 2013 — regulations 33–41 (fishing gear), 49, 75 (Bay of Islands), Schedule 3 (minimum net mesh size), Schedule 14 (defined areas, Auckland and Kermadec FMA)
• Fisheries New Zealand — Rules for fishing gear, methods and measuring
• Fisheries New Zealand — Auckland and Kermadec fishing rules
• Fisheries (Recreational Management Controls) Notice No. 1 2026 — baitfish daily limit
• Northland Regional Council — Marine protection areas (rāhui tapu)
• NRC — Environment Court confirms no-take fishing areas in Northland (2023)
• NRC — Commercial fisher caught as council clamps down on rāhui tapu rulebreakers (2024)
• NZ Herald — Northland's no-take areas face uncertain future under fishing reforms (Aug 2026)
• Fish Forever — Amateur fishing regulations in the Bay of Islands

Action Outdoors Limited has been making fishing nets in New Zealand for over 55 years. Every net we build is made to the mesh sizes the rules allow, and we are always happy to talk through what is legal where you fish. actionoutdoors.kiwi

Guide current as at September 2026. This is general information, not legal advice. Always confirm the current rules with Fisheries New Zealand — free NZ Fishing Rules app, or 0800 4 POACHER to report illegal fishing.