New sanctuary opens at spit
A community conservation effort to restore a safe home for seabirds, rare native plants, giant snails and geckos has been celebrated in Golden Bay.
The Wharariki Eco-sanctuary and predator-proof fence was officially opened on Saturday by Conservation Minister Eugenie Sage.
The sanctuary was established in a partnership between Collingwood business HealthPost, local iwi and the Department of Conservation. It aims to reintroduce fluttering shearwaters and diving petrel to Cape Farewell and to re-establish a new breeding colony on the mainland.
About 200 people attended the opening at Cape Farewell, including HealthPost staff, representatives of three local iwi, project trustee Craig Potton, patron and broadcaster Kim Hill, and Collingwood Area School pupils.
The 200-metre fence will protect three hectares of the coastal headland. Work began in September 2019 and was completed in December.
Sage said the sanctuary was one of the projects crucial to providing safe havens for threatened plants and wildlife on mainland New Zealand.
Thanks to the new fence and planned predator control work, native plants and wildlife would be able to thrive without being browsed or eaten, while contributing to the goal of achieving a Predator Free NZ by 2050, she said.
Large seabird colonies on coastal cliffs were once common on the mainland before pests such as rats and stoats and land clearance decimated their populations and destroyed the habitat they depended on. Significant breeding populations of burrowing seabirds are now relegated largely to offshore islands.
‘‘The Wharariki Ecosanctuary project highlighted what can be achieved when businesses, iwi and communities come together, supported by Government, to give nature a helping hand,’’ Sage said.
‘‘It’s an enormous ambition. It’s one that will need a lot of mahi from everyone, but it is visionary.’’
The project will be assisted by a $59,200 grant from DOC’s Community Conservation Fund to support the restoration of
Wharariki stream and wetland and expand existing predator trap lines.
For HealthPost chair Peter Butler, the opening was a ‘‘heartfelt’’ culmination of the work and support given by the wider Golden Bay community and the sanctuary’s supporters.
He paid special tribute to the Manawhenua ki Mohua [local iwi], and to the project’s field operative, Grant Williams, for his work on the final aspects of the sanctuary.
The Farewell Wharariki HealthPost Nature Trust was established in 2017, and so far more than $187,000 has been donated to the project, which has been used for predator trapping, fencing, camera monitoring and planting trees.
HealthPost hopes to raise $100,000 a year to fund the ecosystem restoration and native species protection project. Company staff and volunteers maintained trap lines each year and took time off to plant 1000 trees.
This year, the aim is to remove predators before the first seabirds are hopefully relocated from offshore islands to the site by early 2021.
The Wharariki Ecosanctuary in Golden Bay was officially opened at the weekend. Nelson Mail photographer LUZ ZUNIGA joined those celebrating the milestone for conservation work in the region.