Plant it forward

Local children plant amongst the gorse at Manawa Karioi.

PAY for your carbon indiscretions by planting trees this weekend.  The Manawa Karioi Ecological Project, occupying about 12 hectares of farmland around Island Bay’s Tapu Te Ranga Marae, is marking the United Nations Year of the Forest with the beginning of its planting season, on May 8.
“It was the decision of Tapu Te Ranga Marae to return the land to forest, for the general public to enjoy,” says Manawa Karioi spokesperson Ross Gardiner.
The project focuses on the replanting of species that are rare or departed from the southern and eastern suburbs.
“It’s been going on for 20 years now, and we’re getting to the point of ‘secondary forest plantings’, that is, planting the species that need shelter to grow up under. That sort of forest has almost completely disappeared from these suburbs.”
They are propagating more than 1,000 nikau, as well as “forest giants” like totara, rimu and matai. At 20 years old, the longest established part of the bush has encouraged the return of significant numbers of tui, and Manawa Karioi spokespeople expect kereru to follow.
The public is invited to attend a working bee on Sunday to plant nikau, rewarewa, titoki, kohekohe, tawa and rata. Meet at the information shelter, 150m up the Tapu Te Ranga Marae driveway off Danube Street.
“[We’ll be plating for] up to an hour and a half, followed by a social event in the Marae buildings with mulled wine and soup to keep the spirits up.”