ISTANBUL

A native and endangered freshwater fish thought to be extinct from wetlands in New Zealand’s northern Auckland region has resurfaced after more than a decade of searching.

Populations of the rare black mudfish have been relocated in a small corner of Helensville in the last couple of months, local broadcaster RNZ reported on Wednesday.

Auckland Council's senior regional freshwater advisor, Matt Bloxham, said the findings in October came as a surprise.

"We've been looking since 2014, spreading the net, as it were, to other areas," Bloxham said, noting that the species requires specific conditions in terms of habitat.

"It was this year that we found two new populations, so it's been quite an amazing year for us," he said, adding that the latest finds were located in a small body of water.

Bloxham said several pressures have reduced black mudfish populations, including invasive plants and pest fish, but the biggest danger is the loss of roughly 90% of local wetlands.

Their situation is so fragile that, according to Bloxham, the small stretch of water where they were discovered only weeks earlier has now almost completely dried up.

Julie Underwood, an ectotherm keeper at Auckland Zoo, explained that the native fish would have since burrowed into the mud and gone dormant.

"They have abilities like surviving out of water, so they don't have scales; they have leathery skin with a mucus layer, and they can actually absorb oxygen through that as long as they're damp."