Biological treasure trove

Forest and Bird, Volume 18, Issue 1, 1 February 1987, Page 6

Biological treasure trove

In January a scientific expedition to Southland’s Eyre Mountains was led by Society President Dr Alan Mark and included Conservation Director Gerry McSweeney. Focusing on the 34,000-ha Eyre Creek-Canaird Crown land block, the expedition discovered an extraordinary biological treasure trove. Unfortunately, unless there is major public protest, the area will soon be under the control of Landcorp. The greywacke Eyre Mountains are sandwiched between Otago’s schist mountains and Fiordland, and have long been regarded as home to unusual plants and animals, but have been little explored scientifically. A large population of rock wrens, one of the few recorded away from the Southern Alps, has been discovered, a large number of dotterel are present in the tussock lands and parakeet have been discovered in the extensive beech areas of the property. Rock wrens in particular are a species which are becoming increasingly rare. Some of the plant distributions are rare; the mountain daisies Celmisia philocremna and Celmisia thomsonii are restricted to the Eyre Mountains within the Crown land block. More than 60 percent of the block, which extends up to 2000m altitude, is severely eroded and eroding land where Government policy precludes grazing, while much of the balance has significant natural values. No land allocation should be made until all the area’s values have been assessed.