Lady Peg Fleming

Forest and Bird, Volume 21, Issue 1, 1 February 1990, Page 32

Lady Peg Fleming

Last year, the Royal Forest and Bird Protection Society was awarded the inaugural Charles Fleming Award for environmental work. This award, a medal, handed out by the Royal Society of New Zealand, commemorates the achievements of scientist and conservationist, Sir Charles Fleming, who died in 1987. Forest and Bird’s Education and Extension Officer Andrea Lomdanhl talks to Lady Peg Fleming about her husband and how he would have felt about Forest and Bird being the first recipient of this award.

Aree LomdahI: Sir Charles was one of NZ's first conservation knights and his leadership inspired a generation of conservationists. Forest and Bird is greatly honoured to receive this award. Do we deserve it? Peg Fleming: Yes, you do deserve it. 1 know that Charles would have been very pleased that the Royal Society awarded Forest and Bird this medal. In the early days Forest and Bird had a big membership but its attraction was the weekend outings and summer camps it arranged and the journal. It had no political clout. Charles couldn't bear that, knowing that New Zealand needed dedicated people with knowledge of its extremely important flora and fauna to fight for the preservation of their environment. Here were the people. He became a member of the executive and from then on the structure began to change quite rapidly until now Forest and Bird has become a very important environmental action group, speaking with the backing of a large cross section of the population. Charles would certainly have approved of the way the Society has diversified into so many new issues. Not only are they fighting to save our native forests, but they are speaking out on all conservation fronts, even marine resources. AL: Sir Charles began the campaign to save the Mamaku kokako forests with his Listener editorial "Mammon on the Mamaku". What are your thoughts and how would Sir Charles have felt about the Tasman Accord which now protects the remaining Mamaku forest for the kokako? PF: | feel as though the Tasman Accord is like a memorial to Charles. When he was young he used to go for holidays to Rotorua with his family. He used to take his push bike and ride up into the bush to enjoy the robins and other bush birds. That was when he developed his great love for the Mamakus.

Later he got to know a group of local farmers and Catchment Board chaps who used to write to him and let him know what was going on behind the screen of native bush along the roadsides, showing their great concern. Charles and I had shares in Forest Products, inherited from our fathers who bought shares in this new company after the slump of the early thirties. It was hoped it would help New Zealand industry and bring work to the unemployed. Together with other shareholders from this group of Hauraki Plains men he wrote to the company to tell them we were concerned their clearfelling operations were ignoring soil and water conservation values and that there was a need for native forest reserves. The water coming out of those streams where logging was taking place was full of silt and destroying river life. The day the Accord was signed, Conservation Minister Philip Woollaston unveiled a memorial to Charles at Waimeha Lagoon, Waikanae. I think he purposely planned the two events to happen on the same day, knowing how important the Mamakus were to him. Charles would have been so pleased. AL: How did Sir Charles develop his love of nature and interest in science and conservation? PF: It started when he was very young. Neither of his parents was involved in science but they gave him a lot of encouragement. Each summer his family spent time at Takapuna Beach, Auckland where he collected shells on the reef. It was there he developed his interest in marine biology. On his eighth birthday his parents gave him the book he had asked for — Suter’s Manual of New Zealand Mollusca. Charles went to King’s Primary School and there was one teacher there who used to take the boys to the reefs near Auckland. He noticed that Charles had a special interest in conchology and one day asked a friend, Dr A

W B Powell, conchologist at the Auckland War memorial Museum, to come along on one of these trips. Charles vanished away from the main group, that was typical of him when he was young; he used to vanish and do his own thing. When he came he came back, he’d found a nudibranch, which Dr Powell was keen to have when he realised that it was a new species. Charles had quite enough knowledge at the Primary School age to know that he had made a new discovery and he wasn't going to give it up. That was when Powell recognised Charles’ special talent. From them on Charles became involved in Powell's Shell Club at the Museum and here he met Bob Falla (Later Sir Robert) another man who was to shape his future life. Powell took Charles to the Chatham Islands and the Waverley on the West Coast on shell collection expeditions and at 17 he was invited to join the "Will Watch" expedition to the Three Kings and other islands with Dr Powell, Dr Falla, geologist Professor J A Bartrum and Graham Turbott, Geoff Baylis and others. This expedition, in the first term of Charles 7th form year at Kings College, made him determined to leave school and go to University. He finally got his own way. At varsity we did the same subjects, zoology, botany, geology and chemistry, but Charles had a BA degree as well. I had had ambitions to be a PhysEd teacher, but Charles soon changed that. The expeditions and trips we did were far more interesting and after my first year of a BA degree I changed to science and completed my BSc the same year as he did. Scientific research was always Charles’ greatest joy and his interests were exceptionally broad but when he saw his precious Mamaku forest being clearfelled and replaced with Pinus radiata he realised that he must put a lot more of his energy into conservation.

AL: Did Sir Charles realise his effect on up and coming conservationists? PF: | think he was amazed at the number of young people he influenced. He never expected to do so but was relieved and pleased when he found some young people getting behind him and that was terrific because Charles often was fighting battles on his own, a lone voice crying in the wilderness. When the Native Forest Action Council came into action, Charles supported them in every way he could, especially he tried to guide them. The Environmental Defence Society followed them, and many other conservation organisations now under the umbrella of ECO came on the NZ scene. Charles’ correspondence became terrific as he tried to give help and advice to all who sought it. I think I was the optimist and Charles the realist. He understood issues and tried to guide everything in the right direction. He was a very shy person and it used to be a strain for him to get up and speak in public. It used to cost him a lot of sleep and worry yet he always rose to the occasion. Many people thought that the heart attack he had about 20 years ago was a result of the fight over Manapouri. He felt things very intensely and the sight of Lake Monowai nearby filled him with horror. Well, to return to the mention of the Memorial at the Waimeha Lagoon. The brass plate on the lovely greywacke boulder reads "In appreciation of the contribution made by the late Sir Charles Fleming to the Waikanae Community." A very touching tribute from a

small community much loved by our family. The lagoon where the memorial stands is now a Wildlife Reserve. Here Forest and Bird has erected a "hide" which is enjoyed by everyone, even the swallows. Many young families visit it regularly to see the ducks, swans, shags and dabchicks. It is serving an important educational function. Charles worked to save this lagoon and wetland area from being drained and filled for beach housing. Another of his concerns was the estuary at the Waikanae river mouth, the main ; spawning ground for the fish of the coast. After a battle with developers who thought they could control the river mouth to low water mark, the main part of the estuary was designated a Scientific Reserve now under the management of Doc.

AL: What are your memories of Sir Charles’ public statements on conservation? PF: | think one of Charles’ most powerful speeches was at the 1985 Environmental Forum. He felt so strongly about the need for a really good Department of Conservation. Towards the end of the meeting he rose to speak. Many present will remember. The subject was the scatter of isolated "green dots" (groups working on conservation) through the existing departments of government and the proposal to being them all together in one nature conservancy or Department of Conservation. Charles’ final plea to the Environmental Forum was — "If Government could form this big green dot then this little green dot will die happy.’ Three daughters and six grandchildren along with me have been influenced by his thoughts — as our oldest daughter puts it — "Life in the Fleming family fostered a deep love of the outdoors; birds, trees, lakes and hills of New Zealand and a lifelong dedication to conservation and wildlife preservation." ¥