5. KAINGAROA PLATEAU SHRUBLANDS — A UNIQUE RESERVE?

Forest and Bird, Volume 15, Issue 4, 1 November 1984, Page 28

5. KAINGAROA PLATEAU SHRUBLANDS — A UNIQUE RESERVE?

National Conservation Officer

Dr Gerry McSweeney

Kaingaroa, one of the world’s largest man-made forests, was planted on land largely covered not by native forest, but by fire-dominated natural shrublands growing on Taupo pumice and volcanic ash. Virtually all these shrublands have now been lost to pines and pasture. The recently published register of Protected Natural Areas in New Zealand (available from Lands and Survey Head Office for $25.00) identifies no natural reserves in the entire Kaingaroa ecological district. DSIR studies suggest that a mere 1 percent of the Volcanic Plateau shrublands of 1840 survive today. A 600-hectare natural shrubland block of monoao (Dracophylilum subulatum) — kanuka dominant shrubland has just been identified on Crown land near the Otamatea Stream adjoining the Kaingaroa forest. DSIR Botany Division has recommended the entire area become a scientific reserve and that development of the area to farmland proposed for this summer not proceed. The Otamatea reserve would provide an invaluable baseline against which to compare chagges in soils caused by exotic afforestation. This example highlights the urgent need to secure representative reserves in the face of widespread land development. ot