TRIP REPORT : Johnny’s Bush and Fenaughty covenant

5 May 2007

Johnny’s Bush

BotSoccers in Johnny’s Bush.   Photo: Jack Fenaughty.

BotSoc spent 2.5 hours in Johnny’s Bush, adding eleven species to the plant list.   Advanced, second-growth podocarp / tawa / kohekohe forest with emergent rewarewa and pukatea, the Bush is surrounded by largelyindigenous shrubland and reverting pasture.   Some years ago, Chris and I saw from near British Peak, what looked like a substantial area of tawa forest nestled in a steep-sided valley, invisible from, and about a kilometre west of, Makara Road.   We resolved to explore it and in 2001, with permission from Meridian Energy, we dropped down into it from near Quartz Hill.   Its size, the stature and species diversity of the forest immediately impressed us although it was then being grazed by stock and heavily browsed by possums and goats.   We advised Meridian and Wellington Conservancy of the Department of Conservation, of its significance, and a DOC Covenant is now being negotiated.   DOC has repaired the fencing, enabling groundcover and understorey species to recover - palatable fern species such as Asplenium bulbiferum / hen and chickens, are noticeably more numerous.   The presence of a large, ancient karaka with 4 trunks of (est.) d.b.h. 30, 30, 35 and 45 cm. respectively, makes one wonder whether this sheltered, well-watered, gently-contoured, forested site might have been a kainga in earlier times.

Barbara Mitcalfe, (scribe)

Fenaughty covenant

Fenaughty’s Bush is 5.5 ha of semicoastal forest which has been fenced off by the owners for the past 12 years and has recently been registered as a QEII covenant.   Much of the canopy is ngaio, although there is also manuka, mahoe and mapou.   Hawthorn, barberry and holly have grown up with the canopy and at this stage, ancient pine trees are the only emergent trees.   There are also two small areas of pine plantation within the covenant, and when they are harvested, sufficient monies from the harvest will be used to revegetate these areas with local native species.

Wellington Regional Council has funded poisoning of many of the exotics from their covenant establishment fund, however more funding will be applied for from the Biodiversity Condition Fund to finish the work.

The Fenaughtys control mustelids, rats and possums in the covenant, and this is evident by the presence of many healthy possum-preferred species such as Pseudopanax spp, titoki, wineberry, kohekohe, mahoe and milk tree.   The discovery of the milk tree caused much discussion as to which species it was, however it has been provisionally recorded as Streblus banksii.   With Johnny’s Bush and Post Office Bush less than 3 km of kereru flight away, it won’t be too long before tawa and kohekohe appear in large numbers.

Participants :   Bev Abbott, Marc Slade, Julia White, Rodney Lewington, Sheelagh Leary, Barbara Mitcalfe, Chris Horne, Jill Fenaughty, Jack Fenaughty (co-leader), Lynsie Kerr, Barry Dent, Sue Freitag, Peter Simpson, Cathye Haddock, Mick Parsons, Chris Hopkins, Robyn Smith (co-leader, scribe)