Nursery Fridays are in full swing with potting, moving plants, pricking out seedlings, track clearing, even full nursery watering a few weeks ago! We usually have between 10-15 volunteers attending Friday mornings, so it is busy! Networking is rife with newcomers benefitting from the experience of others, not to mention the morning teas!
On the plant front everything is happening – a warm, and now wetter spring has brought out lots of native flowers from Fuchsia, kohuhu, clematis and a mass flowering of kowhai. This means lots of bird activity. I located for the first time (in 20+ years) a tui nest in our restoration area, so it proves that by providing the habitat and pest control that they will come! It goes without saying the providing a food source like kowhai will bring nectar feeders like tui and bellbird in to feed. Interestingly waxeyes are also nectar feeders but have not evolved in NZ – they “raid” the cap of the flower with their sharp beaks and get food that way rather than feeding up the long flower as tui and bellbirds do (see photos). I also recently saw two falcons at Tautuku and a shining cuckoo at our place.
In the nursery itself seedlings are all coming up and pricking out will be a major job for many weeks. This year we are also taking over the Bushy Point plant order so there will be less plants available to the public, but still lots of plants for sale at the moment from shelter species to forest restoration to wetland species. We are always on hand on Fridays to give advice so pop in and see us on Friday mornings between 9am and noon.
Note the Nursery will be closed on Friday 25th November 22 as we have a full day event booked in the Education Centre that day.
The Education Centre and property was the venue for the latest two day NMIT Trapping Workshop on 19-20 October. Under Tutor Steve Price, ten participants went through the detail of planning a pest trapping operation, pest species characteristics and behaviours, legal requirements, trap types and operation and then sessions in the field setting out traplines with hip chain and compass and setting up a variety of mustelid, rat and possum traps in the bush. Steve was assisted by Kate Hamilton and Tim Exton from DOC who also brought with them a variety of new traps and tools for people to get hand-on experience with. With the indoor and outdoor settings here it is a good location to run practical courses like this and we look forward to more such courses being run here. The biodiversity based courses are run through DOC and available by booking - https://www.doc.govt.nz/get-involved/training/field-based-courses/
Apple Grafting Workshop with the Guytons at the Southland Community Nursery - 9.30am-11am Sunday 25 September 2022 - see details on poster below and book directly at http://www.trybooking.co.nz/LNZ
Although we have been “officially closed” a lot has still been happening as usual around here, preparing for spring (orchards, veggie beds, fruit cages), major planting events - at Te Rere and coming up at Bushy Point 11 September 2022. We hosted Josie and her Reforest Southland group Sunday 28 September - great to see all the new native planting groups springing up – W reforestsouthland.co.nzFfacebook.com/ReforestSouthland and we have had a major cleanout and have lots of pots, root trainers and planter bags to give away to a good home! The Community Nursery will be open for Volunteers from 9am Friday 9 September 22 and Friday mornings thereafter. Also, some exciting events coming up including back by popular demand another fabulous Jo Ogier art workshop weekend here in October.
For the Opening of the Nursery on Friday 9th September we also have a special treat – Charmin Dahl will give a talk after morning tea based around her recent conservation trip to Borneo – details below
Project Dragonfly’s Earth Expedition: Borneo
Charmin will be here to share her experiences in the field in the Sabah region of Borneo, Malaysia as part of her Masters in Conservation Biology. We’ll take a behind-the-scenes look at some of the work being done in the following areas: Eco-tourism, Scientific Research, and Community-based Conservation. Special attention will be paid to specific habitat restoration projects, connecting communities to nature, and organizations’ use of social and traditional media. Plus, lots of photos of orangutans, elephants, monkeys, and more!
Other Events coming up -
Ecofest Event Invercargill Saturday 17 September 22 – to book your table and for more details contact Jenny directly -
Apple Grafting Workshop with the Guytons at the Community Nursery – Sunday 25 September 22- taking bookings now -
Jo Ogier Art workshop at the Community Nursery – Keeping a Botanical Sketchbook – Weekend 29/30 October 2022 – places limited so book early at
We have done the bulk of the cuttings we need for the Nursery – Olearia,Fuchsia, Hebe, Celery pine, bog pine, cottonwood, broadleaf, mountain totara etc, so we are taking a break until end of August.
However, if you have cuttings you would like to do or learn more about I am happy to run some group workshops if there is demand. So email me to arrange that or if you have any other queries or requests (eg pruning workshops, grafting etc) -
Otherwise, see you in springtime (there are signs in the garden this week that its not too far away!!).
