News

The Pīngao & Toheroa Award is not given out annually. It is to celebrate the exceptional contributions of an individual to coastal restoration only when someone of very high calibre comes to our attention. Recipients of this award automatically become honorary members of the Trust.

This year however, the P&T Award went to a couple for the first time. Graham and Lyn Pearson compliment each other so well, and do such excellent work as a team, that they qualified for this honour together.

Graham and Lyn have been the heartbeat of the Whanganui community for years, and attended CRT conferences since 2011.

It is through their efforts that the Castlecliff Coast Care Group has gone from strength to strength. They work with university students, both local and international, to help with their research. Young school kids get invaluable education through planting days with the group, and each patch has a signboard to honour the class that planted it.

Graham and Lyn continue to take on wattle and replant at their own pace. They arrange community driftwood sculpture competitions and will always be there to present evidence based arguments if they don’t agree with proposals for Castlecliff.

They have always had enlightening and engaging presentations in the regional roundups at conference, which focus on a learning point for the year.

Their immense achievements in their community and coastal area makes Graham and Lyn the perfect double recipients of the Pīngao and Toheroa Award, and the Trust was thrilled to present them with the beautiful trophy that was designed and carved by James te Tuhi.

First image: Previous P&T recipient Jason Roberts, presenting Graham and Lyn Pearson with the trophy.

Second image: CRT Chair Laura Shaft, Lyn Pearson, Jason Roberts, Graham Pearson.

Photo credit to Simon Hoyle, Southlight Studios.

The Coastal Restoration Award recognises on the ground results achieved through team work and tenacity. The award is generously sponsored by Coastlands Plant Nursery.

This year at the Kāwhia conference, the award was presented to the Kūaotunu Dune Care Group.

This group in Kūaotunu, on the eastern coast of Coromandel Peninsula north of Whitianga, originally formed to tackle a growing weed problem in their dunes. With 3 kilometres of dune to restore, they broke up the area into manageable sections and identied weed species and notable plants. They produced a restoration plan, set up a Facebook group and wrote articles for the local paper. This has resulted in large turnouts of volunteers at their regular monthly working bees.

With a grant of almost $10,000 they started work in Zone 1. Under the weeds they found the site had dumped concrete and metal pipes but because of the cultural significance of the site and the presence of native skinks they removed all the rubble by hand. They have complete 7 large restoration plantings and are involved in four sites along the coastline.
The group is supported by Thames-Coromandel District Council and Waikato Regional Council.

We applaud the incredible hardwork of the Kūaotunu Dune Group and look to seeing their progress in the future.

If you are involved in a group that you think deserves this award, or would like to nominate a group, keep an eye out for when nominations open for next year!

Our scholarship committee was very pleased to announce the winner of the Coastal Restoration Trust Post Graduate Scholarship for 2024 at the recent conference held in Kāwhia.

The scholarship was awarded to Sanne Vaassen, a PhD candidate at Waikato University who presented her research at the conference.

The aim of her PhD research is to better understand how different estuarine vegetative species in coastal ecosystems compete for space and how the distribution of their habitats will change as a result of sea level rise in the coming decades. Specifically, she is focusing on saltmarsh and mangrove systems and how these shape estuarine morphology and attenuate waves and currents. Better understanding of these processes will offer valuable knowledge which can be used in coastal management and restoration decision making. Sanne’s research is supported by Future Coasts Aotearoa.

Congratulations Sanne! We look forward to further updates in your future research.

A collaboration between scientists at The Coastal Restoration Trust and Janet Andrews and Simon Hoyle from Southlight Studios has produced a series of videos on coastal processes

Hosted by the Historical Society of Eastbourne, Janet & Simon presented some of the CRT videos to over 50 people. Living on the shores of Wellington harbour, locals were keen to learn about coastal processes and find out more about the Coastal Restoration Trust.

In 2019, an Estuarine Vulnerability Assessment (EVA) was carried out by Robertson Environmental to guide the development of a new estuary monitoring programme.
To provide a representative assessment, 20 sites were included. This included the region’s larger estuaries north and south of the ring plain, as well as a number of smaller
stream mouths where tidal intrusion was marginal but may occasionally occur. Three main outputs were provided for each estuary: a habitat map, a vulnerability rating and
recommendations for future monitoring.

Overall vulnerability to the effects of sedimentation and eutrophication was determined to be ‘high’ in five estuaries, ‘moderate to high’ in another five, ‘moderate’ in nine and ‘minimal’ in one. Where the vulnerability of an estuary was ‘high’ or ‘moderate to high’, this was largely due to the effects of sedimentation rather than eutrophication. This was the case for seven of the 20 estuaries assessed, namely. Mōhakatino, Tongaporutu, Urenui, Mimitangiatua, Waitara, Pātea and Waitōtara.

Vulnerability to sedimentation was generally attributed to high sediment loads from the catchment, and the high proportion of soft mud cover in the estuary that was mapped during the condition assessment. Eutrophication was considered less of an issue. What we know in these estuaries due to them being well flushed, with no primary symptoms such as macroalgae and/or phytoplankton blooms identified during the condition assessments.

Vulnerability to eutrophication effects was ‘moderate to high’ for three estuaries, the Whenuakura, Oakura and Katikara. The latter two were the only estuaries where
symptoms of eutrophication, in the form of phytoplankton blooms, were recorded. Other estuaries, such as the Whenuakura, were considered susceptible to eutrophication
due to large areas of intertidal habitat which can support macroalgal blooms, high catchment nutrient loads, and where they were poorly flushed or restricted at the mouth.

To read more about estuaries in general and detail about the results of the survey go here.