Water safety on Tauranga's northern harbour has become the responsibility of seven retired and semi-retired men who are the regional harbour master's eyes and ears at the Bowentown end.

Ranging in age from their 50s to their 70s, the volunteers spend the summer days patrolling around the Tanners Point/Katikati/Waihī Beach area ensuring everyone – boaties, jet skiers, kayakers, wind surfers and any other kind of water craft users – sticks to the rules and gets home safe.

Some of the northern harbour wardens. From left: Leon Herbert, Mike Palmer, Tim Chadwick, Ken Whatford and Noel Haszard.

Most of their work is done through talking to people and being visible in their clearly-marked Harbour Master's boat, which makes most boaties slow down, don their life jackets and behave better on the water.

'We basically act as the Harbour Master's right hand,' says Noel Haszard, who is over 70-years-old. 'Our role is mainly educational, observing activities on the water and ensuring boaties know what's expected of them,”

He's spent 19 years as a volunteer, turning out in all weathers to keep others safe on the water.

'In the last four years the number of craft has grown immensely,” he adds, 'and we couldn't do what we do without the equipment we now have.

'It used to be just a foot patrol, which wasn't much use when the problems are out on the water. Now we have a small boat and a jet ski which give us much more visibility.”

Noel is ex-Coastguard, and the other six north end wardens are keen boaties who come from a wide variety of backgrounds – a plumber, electrical and refrigeration, retired farmer, oil exploration, mining – before they put their hands up for the job.

Since late December they have completed more than 200 hours of patrols. That's 70-to-95 hours each. The wardens re-train every year in boat safety, boat handling, and are all qualified boat masters.

This summer they rescued 10 boats which misjudged the tide and found themselves in difficulty, while boat owners from other countries are also an issue as they often have little knowledge of their own recently-bought boat, the sea and its dangers.

Noel says: 'Complacency is the biggest problem - ignoring the rules, attitude and lack of knowledge of ebb tides particularly. Then there's the bow riders on vessels travelling at speed, especially children.”

And the wardens have heard every excuse in the book for bad behaviour on the water.

'You name it, we've heard it,” he says. 'The good thing is that this year we've had about 100 percent compliance with carrying lifejackets. Now we just have to get people to wear them.”

The job is not just about patrolling the water; the wardens also get involved in community activities, like fishing competitions, the Nugget Multisport and bathtub races.

And they'd like to see more people put their hand up to join them as volunteers, which would ensure their on-duty rotation left them more time to enjoy the water themselves.

Anyone interested in joining them just needs to contact the Harbour Master's office for assessment and the training required.

'So far this summer there's been 17 deaths on the water nationally, but none in our waters,” adds Noel. 'Our aim is to have no fatalities on the harbour, and it's so far, so good.”