Native Weta

During one of our storms last month a Kanuka, down from the walk bridge, was blown over. When cutting it up for removal (firewood) it was noticed that there was a large Weta hole in the trunk. That section was kept aside and made into a Weta hotel. The Weta was coaxed out with a piece of apple as a lure, stored among forest litter in a shoe box while the trunk was converted, then reintroduced and installed back onto a tree in the gully.

Unfortunately, but not surprisingly, the Weta had had enough by then and has not been seen since. It is hoped that another Weta will discover a really cosy home and take up residence. There are signs of a good Weta population in the area.

Fish Hotels

Yes it has been a month of building accommodation for our fauna. On advice from Waikato Regional Council Fish Scientist we have started installing accommodation to attract more native fish to our stream. Four concrete block hotels were installed in ponds in the gully behind Sexton Road. The target fish are Giant and Banded Kokopu.

To complement this we are planting the stream banks with Carex to provide shade and possible egg-laying sites.

HCC open day at Mangaiti Gully

Hamilton City Council in conjunction with Continuing Education Waikato University is running a number of Hamilton gully open days and lectures on gully restoration. They have scheduled a visit to Mangaiti Gully this Sunday 3rd March at 10am. If you would like to catch up on what is going on in your neighbourhood you would be most welcome to join us. We will be meeting at the concrete pad below the foot bridge which runs from 1 Grenache Place to 60 St James Drive.

Sexton Road track.

Work continued over the last month to upgrade the Sexton Road end of the track. A set of steps was built, retaining work was done on the downhill track and the track was extended over the soft mud area using heavy grade rubber tracking from an earth moving machine as a base. HCC supplied all the timber. Well worth a look if you are out walking.

Landcare Action Conference gully visit

Mangaiti had the honour of hosting fifty five conference attendees for a 45minute gully tour on Tuesday. A number of them were from Australia with one from as far away as Darwin. It would have been great to have more time to talk to them about their experiences as some of them sounded pretty interesting but time did not permit.

Lots of plants growing

We put a funding application in for potting mix and plant purchase from Trust Waikato and, in doing so, added up all the seedling plants that we have growing at some of our volunteers’ homes. There was a staggering 1530! Some will be planted out this winter but most will be grown on to the following winter.

Fish survey

Waikato Regional Council scientists did a survey of 150metres of the stream north of the foot bridge and did spot checks in the ponds at the back of Sexton Road. The findings were really exciting. We will be getting the full report with all the numbers but I can tell you that mature breeding size, 125mm to 160mm, native Kokopu both Banded and Giant were found along with young ones 40 to 65mm. This indicates a good healthy breeding population exists. Most, but not all, were in the ponds at the back of Sexton Road.
Good numbers of Shortfinned Eels were present with lesser numbers of Longfinned. Also plentiful were Retropinna (Common Smelt).
Pest fish found were the odd Catfish and a number of Gambusia (Mosquitofish).
This is a very healthy fish population to build from as we restore to enhance their environment to further increase their population with particular focus on the Kokopu.

Photo: Giant Kokopu and the guys at work (double click on all photos to enlarge)