Riccarton Bush and the Botanic Gardens

In Dr. J's field bio class, we've taken two fieldtrips within Christchurch. Our primary focus, I suppose, has been to become familliar with native New Zealand plants, but in becoming familiar we have been learning even more about New Zealand's history and a lot of New Zealand environmental concerns--other than those that I recently found a bit vexing.

Riccarton Bush is about 20 acres worth of protected native forest that has never been logged. It was set aside by the Dean family (bunch of Scots), who were the first people to set up shop in the Christchurch area and is specially protected from development through an act of parliment that also provides some city money. Money however, mostly comes through donations. A ranger was appointed to manage the area in 1914, though there was a much different concept of upkeep, involving the raking and mowing of the understory. This didn't cease until 1976, when shrubby things were finally allowed to grow up.

Riccarton Bush is protected by a predator fence--kind of like a deer fence, but a little more hardcore--and is thusly one of the best places to find birds, especially natives. We were lucky enough to be followed by a Fantail--New Zealand's answer to the chickadee. It was a friendly and inquisitive little bugger who happily posed for pictures.

John the ranger happily answered a lot of management questions we had including the possible reintroduction of species. He said that he would like to see a population of Tomtits and Riflemen--more native birds--but would have to conspire with the Department of Conservation to get them in there and plenty of native birds seem to be coming back on their own. He also mentioned the Wheta--a big cricket-y thing, and the Canterbury Gecko. There has also been some talk of using Riccarton Bush as sort of an adolescent Kiwi (kiwi like the bird, not like the people) training ground--an intermediate from being born in captivity and being sent into the wild. The major concern with that, though, is that people have a tendency to muff it up. Mostly kids sneaking into the park at night and vandalizing things. They don't want to risk anything bad happening to the birds.

Other than that, main talking points included the Kahikatia--a tree and podocarp, which seems to be the buzzword surrounding trees in New Zealand, also divaricating shrubs. John the ranger also mentioned that wild populations of bees in New Zealand are ultimately going to die out because of a mite that has been destroying colonies. Interestingly enough, though, bees are introduced to New Zealand, so I don't really know how upset I should be.

Max, an old slightly deaf man from the Netherlands, toured us through the Botanic Gardens in Hagley park. I think that my new favorite accent to hear english spoken in is his hybrid of dutch and kiwi. At times, it sounded even a bit scottish.

Nothofagus--southern beeches--were the buzzword of this days exploration of New Zealand plants. Most NZ trees are coniferous, with only 6ish species of deciduous trees. Most of my notes are drawings that all look alike and less than riveting descriptions of plants. I should have probably taken pictures to go with my notes, as I have that technology. Now I know.

The most fun facts I think involved the problems concerning mallards hybridizing with native ducks, seeing native pigeons (though I'm not entirely convinced that they weren't fat rock doves), and realizing that the Maori spent a lot of time making poisionous plants edible--go them!