News & Events

The native sand binding plant Spinifex, or Kowhangatara, has been locally extinct from areas in Canterbury for over 100 years – until now. This year two Canterbury community groups have made huge steps towards restoring this once abundant species to their local beaches. 

Sumner Environment Group in Christchurch City have been replanting areas of the Sumner beach foredune in an effort to increase biodiversity values and reduce wind-blown sand. Monitoring results in May show that Spinifex plants planted in previous years are producing viable seed and seedlings are now appearing on the dunes.  This is a huge success for an area that has, in the past, been completely void of any native sand dune species. Read about their success story

Sumner Environment Group received the 2013 Coastal Restoration Trust Best Coastal Community Group Award

Further north at Te Kohaka o Tuhaitara Coastal Park, 2000 Spinifex plants have been planted by dedicated local community and Council groups. This planting is part of a 575 stretch of North Canterbury coastline being managed with a long term vision to progressively restore the sand dunes, backdunes, forested areas and inland waterways to self sustaining ecosystems of predominantly indigenous species.  The area includes the Tūtaepatu Lagoon which is the largest area of natural open water in the coastal strip between the Waimakariri and Ashley Rakahuri Rivers.  The entire area is highly valuable to local iwi and these values are fundamental to the holistic approach being taken for the restoration work. Read more about Te Kohaka o Tuhaitara

The Restoration goal for Tutaepatu Lagoon is “a lagoon with largely indigenous vegetation that supports mahinga kai and spiritual values”.

These two Canterbury projects were the recipients of the 2013 Coastal Restoration Trust Awards presented at the annual conference in Nelson.

Thames-based coastal scientist Jim Dahm, a trustee on the NZ Coastal Restoration Trust with 20 years involvement in dune restoration by planting native species, has recently visited Gisborne as part of the Coastal Restoration Trust Coastal Backdunes project.  “It’s great to see what Wainui Coast Care is doing. They are a good bunch of people with a great plan — just the sort of nucleus we need in the way beaches are managed,” he said. 

The visit included a meeting at the Wainui Surf Club where Jim talked about reasons for the increased focus on working with nature as opposed to hard engineering in coastal areas.  He talked about the form and function of our coastlines and dune systems as buffers to the sea as well as the basic guidelines for dune restoration and working with nature. He presented a range of case studies of work around New Zealand where the aims have been to restore biodiversity, enhance protection and manage coastal hazards.  Some of these examples included urban areas where combined approaches using both nature and some engineering works were required. 

Jennie Harre-Hindmarsh, who organised the visit, said that it was “very successful”. Click on the links below to read the media articles about this event.  

1.       Caring for our Coast – public forum article, Sat13 July 2013

http://www.gisborneherald.co.nz/article/?id=33193

2. Working with Nature (Wainui Beach Coast Care article and photo, Sat 20 July 2013)

http://www.gisborneherald.co.nz/article/Default.aspx?id=33276

Contact the Coastal Restoration Trust if you would like to be involved in one of our projects or organise a similar event to this one.  

Children are our future ‘coastal carers’ and more and more schools are getting involved in local coastal restoration work as a way of learning about this dynamic environment. 

At Rarawa Beach, in the Far North, local tamariki are an essential part of passing on knowledge about looking after our coasts. Recently tamariki from Ngataki school worked at the Rarawa Beach backdune research site as part of their Matariki and Arbor Day celebrations. 

Ngataki School tamariki planted trees in the backdune site and made (and flew) traditional manu aute - Maori kites along the beach.   

The Rarwa Beach site is one of more than 50 around New Zealand being assessed as part of the Coastal Restoration Trust three year backdune restoration project.  The project aims to investigate the most effective ways of restoring our backdune environments and is supported by the Minsitry for the Environment, Department of Conservation and Councils throughout the country.  For further information on the project click here.     

Susie Mills was so inspired by the Golden Bay/Farewall Spit field trip at the recent Coastal Restoration Trust conference, she decided to organise a local day out for her own, and other, Coast Care groups along the Kapiti Coast. 

She pitched the idea to Rob Cross at Kapiti Coast District Council who was immediately on-board coming up with funds towards the cost of hiring a bus.  Community response was equally positive and the 30 seater bus soon turned into 54 with Greater Wellington chipping in the remaining cost.  Groups from up and down the coast jumped on along with staff from DOC, local and regional council. 

Starting at Paraparaumu the group travelled down the coast stopping and talking about different projects including the Waikanae Estuary and Boating Club foredunes, two propagation facilities, Rangiuru Groups South Otaki Beach foreshore restoration, and a ‘gem’ where Hariata Ropata Tangnahoe and Len Taylor were in the process of carving Tangaroa (God of the sea) looking out towards Kapiti Island from the remains of a foreshore macrocarpa tree stump. The day finished off at the  Waimeha Estuary Waikanae.

Thanks to Mike Odey for providing information for this article and congratulations to the  Field Way Dunes Group for organising such a great event. 

Currently dune restoration focuses on the most visible flora and fauna, however Renee Johansen from the University of Auckland is embarking on a three year PHD that will identify and assess the importance of some of the tiniest, and possibly most significant, elements required to build healthy robust dune ecosystems in the longer term.     

Renee, recipient of the 2013 Coastal Restoration Trust/Quinovic Postgraduate Student Study Award, started her PHD in August 2012 with the University of Auckland and Landcare Research.

Renee is investigating the communities of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) in spinifex and marram grass. AMF are fungi which exist entirely in the plant root or surrounding soil. The fate of the plant hosts they live on and these fungi are intertwined - with the growth and survival of many plants dependant on AMF.

Overseas studies have shown that AMF are important to plant health in harsh dune environments. In addition to providing nutrients, it’s likely that AMF protect dune plants against pathogens, sustain them during drought, and help them tolerate saline sand. 

Renee’s study involves indentifying the range of AMF on spinifex and marram. “Only a couple of hundred of these fungi have been described worldwide but new technology enabling us to sequence their DNA suggests there are thousands.” She will investigate whether spinifex and marram host different AMF communities and examine their relationships with these communities.

Renee suggests that, whilst dune plants may look healthy immediately after planting, especially when fertilised, healthy AMF communities are likely to be vital to buffer plants against environmental extremes and to help prevent disease outbreak in the long term.

Practical application of this research could, for example, show whether spinifex planted into areas previously occupied by marram, and/or alongside marram, would benefit from the co-introduction of natural AMF communities.