Almost 1300 cannabis plants have been uncovered and removed from the Wanganui area during police raids which also netted weapons and property worth thousands of dollars.
In all, 4311 plants were recovered from the central police district aerial operation, with 1286 plants found in the Wanganui area, 1173 in the Manawatu, 1286 in Taranaki and 566 in Ruapehu.
A further 2063 plants were found as the result of police search warrants.
The total of 6374 plants recovered marked a drop from the 9369 plants found last year.
In the central police district, cannabis was found across 92 plots, with 129 offenders identified, resulting in 330 charges.
Property valued at $5800 was seized along with seven rifles, two shotguns, two handguns, 8421 cannabis seeds and 14.1kg of dried cannabis.
Three of the cannabis plots were uncovered more than 20km inland from Waitotara village during a sting operation by Wanganui Police in March.
The plots were on isolated and hilly farmland and the raid yielded 61 plants ranging from 1.3m to 1.8m in height. They were all allegedly part of a commercial operation and ready to harvest.
A 46-year-old Manawatu man was arrested in Palmerston North and charged with cultivating cannabis for supply. His case is still before the court.
The plants were recovered by a contingent of 13 police.
Central police district spokesman Senior Constable Dave Kirk said cannabis numbers were down this year across the country.
"Of course, we can't get a trend from one year's results, but we'd like to think that it is indicative of us making some sort of headway.
"What we have also found this year is a number of smaller plots. If this [was] an attempt to try and go under the radar and outsmart us, it hasn't worked."
Nationwide cannabis operations are run every year and start with an intelligence-gathering phase, followed by a recovery and arrest phase, which includes officers being winched from helicopters to pull plants from the ground.
Raids net cannabis haul
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