Living Water helps to grow local school kids’ green thumb

Date:  01 June 2017

Ben Herbert, DOC / Living Water with Purua School student Aston

Purua School in Northland is building a new nursery to grow native trees and plants, thanks to funding from Living Water, a partnership between Fonterra and DOC.

The native plants grown by the Purua School students will be distributed to famers and other land owners to be used for riparian planting to improve water quality in streams, creeks and drains in the Hikurangi area, North-west of Whangarei.

Funding the school is part of the Living Water Community Initiatives Fund, which has awarded $51,000 to nine community organisations in the last year.

"Small rural schools like Purua are the centres of their communities and the pupils are a big influence on what is important so helping to build their nursery is a great example of how Living Water is working to spread the benefits of planting native trees." says Living Water North Island Programme Lead Tim Brandenburg.

Purua lies within the Wairua catchment of the Kaipara Harbour and is one of five Living Water catchments in dairying regions spread from Northland to Southland that is working to increase ecosystem resilience by reconnecting natural habitats on and off farm and increasing the abundance and variety of native wildlife.

In each catchment, Living Water is working with dairy farmers, iwi, conservation groups, schools and other agencies to develop sustainable dairying systems and practices. These systems and practices will reduce demands on the natural environment while maintaining farm profitability.

The nine recipients of Living Water Community Initiatives Fund in the Kaipara region are:

Purua School

$6000 to build a native plant nursery to further the schools environmental education programme and grow seedlings for local landowners to use for riparian planting.

Tanekaha Community Pest Control Area

$3903 to support ongoing work by Fonterra farmers to trap stoats and other pests that eat kiwi eggs and chicks across an area within the Hikurangi Swamp where Northland brown kiwi are living and breeding.

Ngā Kaitiaki O Ngā Wai Māori

$4900 for riparian planting of native plants on the banks of the Mangawhare Stream and to buy electronic water quality monitoring devices to build their capability and exercise their role as Kaitiaki across the Wairua and Mangakahia catchments.

Integrated Kaipara Catchment Management Group

$5000 to buy electronic water quality monitoring devices and train their hunga mahi to build their capability and exercise their role as Kaitiaki across Kaipara waterways.

Forest Bridge Trust

$7000 for traps to control stoats, possums, rats and other pests that eat eggs and chicks of native birds and destroy native trees and plants. The trust's vision is to create a connected landscape of healthy native forest and flourishing native wildlife from the eastern shore of the Kaipara Harbour to a stretch of the east coast, from Mangawhai Heads to the Tawharanui Peninsula.

Northland Fish and Game Council

$5200 to restore two wetland areas. One wetland is on a Fonterra dairy farm at Mangakaramea the other is a riparian area on retired farm land at the confluence of the Wairua and Mangakahia Rivers.

Mountains to Sea Conservation Trust

$3402 to run eight workshops at Akerama Marae on setting up and running a native plant nursery.

Otamatea Harbour Care Society

$5736 to enable the society to grow an extra 10,000 native plants at its nursery. Farmers and other landowners use the seedlings on their properties for riparian planting and to plant areas prone to
erosion.

Whakapara Marae

$10,000 to assist with the restoration of a Whakapara River oxbow next to the Marae to enhance freshwater habitat for tuna (eels) and improve water quality to enable the community to use it as a swimming hole.

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