We are starting a re-vegetation part of the course this week. My biggest re-vegetation inspiration is my Great-uncle Hugh Wilson. He is the manager of Hinewai reserve on Banks Peninsula (near Akaroa). He has done a huge amount of work to re-vegetate the large valley but his main legacy is that he allowed gorse to grow (to the horror of local farmers). Gorse is a nitrogen-fixing plant so it is great for improving soil conditions, it also provides the right amount of shade for native seedlings to survive and eventually these natives grow taller than the gorse and shade it out, killing it off. Hugh allowed nature to work through this process and has achieved a large native forest regeneration without a huge amount of human intervention.
Stop everything and watch this short documentary right now:
Hugh is incredibly intelligent and creative. He also puts together a biannual newsletter called Pipipi. Hugh hand-writes the newsletter and includes a number of his own beautiful drawings of plants and wildlife. He also adds a few cartoons and his writing is often amusing as well as interesting. I have included subscription information below for anyone interested, it is free but donations recommended!
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ReplyDeleteI have just watched the Documentary and honest your Great-Uncle is my new hero.
ReplyDeleteI love the fact that he had a dream and followed it, even though people called him a fool, he had actually took that and used it. He seems like a great character.
From a person who loves being outdoors I am definitely putting this valley on my bucket list, its amazing how he wants to share it with the world.
I also agree with his point about the more technology we have the more skills we are losing.
If you look at covid for example people (admins etc) lost their jobs and even though there is massive job opportunities in season work and planting trees no-one wants them because they are use to being in an office all day.
Do you know if this method of growing gorse with re planting a native site has been used again?
By far the best blog post in my opinion
Hi yes I have done a revegetation plantings with the gorse still growing, and have seen quite a few mature plantings done this way where eventually the natives will take over.
DeleteThe areas where you have practiced this, has it been on farm land or non farm land? I brought this up with a lady on whose conservation forest / farm I work on and she said because she does farm cattle and have horse that this is not a viable concept because the seed will spread into her paddocks and in return will have to pay and hire workers (me) more to continuously keep the gorse away
DeleteYes she may be right - gorse is very challenging for farms wanting to graze as they tend to avoid grazing it unless they are goats! I have seen the same gorse regen thing happen in many places and this approach was adopted in the Abel Tasman on the Wainui Bay after fire took out the native trees. They let the gorse grow and the natives came through protected by the gorse, which also fixes nitrogen
DeleteYES Fantastic !! Your great uncle is very inspiring, so humble and just getting on with it and his immaculate documentation of everything is amazing, the documentary is also very beautifully filmed.. and he plays the piano , and a hand written newsletter so good.
ReplyDeleteHave you ever been to Milenthorpe park in Golden bay?? Dick Nicolls (who happens to be related to Jenny North) did a similar thing not quite to the same scale but also more than 30 years ago now. He decided to plant natives amongst the eucalypt/ gum trees and everyone thought he was crazy but it proved to have the same effect as gorse a great nursery crop and eventually the NZ natives take over.