Gift by Brothers

Forest and Bird, Issue 300, 1 May 2001, Page 41

Gift by Brothers

Laird’s Reserve was donated to the Society in 1966 by the two brothers L.J. and R.B. Laird as a living memorial to their father, Charles Richard Laird, the first settler in the Turakina Valley. At seven hectares it is the smallest of the reserves managed by the branch. It is situated in a sheltered gully and accessed via a public easement from Mangahoe Rd, 10 kilometres west of Hunterville. The reserve represents a small portion of a block of virgin forest that escaped the devastation of a huge bush fire

in 1898. Its vegetation consists of towering kahikatea forest with matai, totara, rimu and occasional miro over a tawa dominant subcanopy. Some magnificent totara, rimu and kahikatea can be seen from the circular track inside the reserve. Over the years the branch has planted cabbage trees, kahikatea, totara and tarata along the banks of the stream running along the southern boundary. — PETER WHITE, a member of Forest and Bird’s national executive, is currently reviewing the management plans of the Society’s reserves. FR Re t ;