WADE T DOAK'S BLOG: BEST OF TUTUKAKA COAST SCENERY, LOCATIONS, WILDLIFE DVD

TUTUKAKA COAST FORESTS

While familiarising ourselves with the coastal trees and shrubs of Whale Bay Reserve at

the same time we were learning to recognise all those in our own piece of forest, some

five kilometres from the coast but running out to the tidal Ngunguru River. Over many

years Jan and I had developed extensive picture files of the marine life on this coast and

up in its mangrove estuaries. Now, in the forest exploration phase of our lives,

equipped with digital cameras, we could afford to document each plant as a journey

through its life cycle, from seedling to bloom. Guided by a check list of plants recorded

for our ecological region and aided by local experts Guy Bowden, Lisa Forester and our

Forest and Bird friends, we set out to locate each species and trace its annual cycle. Our

computer built up a huge file which is easy to extend, revise and upgrade.

Gradually our want list induced us to explore further a field, checking out the Hugh

Crawford Memorial Reserve, Bratty’s Bush Reserve, the Soda Spring Reserve and

other Tutukaka coast forest remnants until we had completed our digital data base.

Besides trees and shrubs, it includes vines, ferns, orchids, grasses [ etc.], herbs, fungi

and lichens [etc]. By this stage we had become painfully aware there were certain plants

on the Tutukaka Coast that are rare or restricted to a few locations.

At Woolley's Bay one spring day (mid-October) I sighted what I thought was an

amazingly early pohutukawa in bloom. Out on a branch a host of bees were feasting on

vivid red star burst blossoms. This I discovered was a M. carminea rata vine. I know of

only two others in this area.

On the slopes of Whale Bay our plant list expanded when, in late October, we

discovered the lemon-scented clematis C. foetida with its delicate strings of pale yellow

flowers; a new record for the area. Nearby were hybrid lancewoods and, where the hill

meets the flats, dozens of healthy bushes of N.Z. gloxinia Rhabdothamnus. Along the

main track in early November the fragrant native jasmine has pendant blooms that

develop into long black seed pods like skinny beans. The vine spirals so tightly around

its host tree it leaves a continuous groove up its trunk.

At Matapouri on a steep slope we found a few tree tutu bushes, so abundant in forests

further north. And on the flat below, a strange puriri with pure white flowers rather than the

usual pink. On a rock outcrop near the beach, Melicytus novae-zelandiae another

rarity in this area. Around the cliffs were karo with their dusk scented deep red flowers;

on a hill ridge was an aged ngaio, leaves dotted with tiny oil glands; and in forest behind

the estuary, a solitary hard beech, Notofagus truncata fell out of a land slip. In two beach

areas we found the fuchsia, F. procumbens with cornflower blue and golden flowers,

exquisite enough to die for. Beside the road south a small group of rare tree daisies,

Olearia solandri which bear masses of minute starry white flowers in mid-April.

At the Soda Spring Reserve, after having a refreshing soda drink from the bubbling

forest edge spring, we found nearby a massive puka vine writhing up an ancient totara,

along with several big ratas. Possums delight in feasting on the lush, broad leaves of

puka. Their hosts are a sign of old growth trees. Such mighty vines with their distinctive

ribbed stems are becoming all too rare a sight.

On Tutukaka Lighthouse Reserve close to the lighthouse itself, is a perfectly spherical,

wind-compacted haekaro, P. umbellatum along with several rare shrubs. The Bowden

property just to the north has a patch of rare king ferns, poataniwha shrubs and a very

rare coastal maire tree.

Around the shores of Tutukaka Harbour we were staggered to find a group of grass

trees, Dracophyllum on a forgotten ridge; a mountain maire above the marina;

snowberry shrubs on terraces above the car park and in a sequestered corner,

a rare colony of Pratia (Colensoa) a lobelia-like native, with big soft leaves and blue-purple

flowers and berries.

TANE MOANA IN 1972

In a small D.O.C. Reserve just behind Tutukaka, stands the GIANT KAURI: Tane Moana. Jan and I measured it carefully. A metre above ground level its girth is 11.16 metres. It would be over a thousand years old. While not as tall, its girth is as great as some of the famous trees in Waipoua Forest.

In Ngunguru Reserve behind the public library the forks of a few pohutukawa trees

support epiphytic shrubs of P. cornufolium, with their attractive scarlet seed capsules.

Up the river we have found a ngaio tree, brilliant M. fulgens rata and several grass trees. A

mountain maire and P. umbellatum both extend from the bush over salt water.

Up stream, where fresh water begins near the Scow Landing, we found a huge titoki on

the river bank and a grove of sturdy ribbonwoods Plagianthus regius out in a paddock.

Scattered through the area we know of a few hinau, pukatea, Kirk's daisy; tawa, miro:

matai, kawaka, akeake, tarata, tawapou and kohuhu; all sporadic or rare. The whau tree,

lightest wood in the world and once an attractive part of this coastal forest, has now

vanished from the wild, but one lives on the saddle to Pebbly Beach.

At odd secluded places along Ngunguru estuary we have discovered rare colonies of mairehau bushes, their refreshingly aromatic leaves, stunning white flowers and red berries make me wonder why such a lovely native plant should become so scarce and forgotten.

Northland forests are especially diverse because they support species with sub tropical

origins as well as temperate climate trees. The Tutukaka Coast is part of an ecological

district extending north to the Bay of Islands and south almost to Whangarei Heads, in

which forest types vary in a rich mosaic of patches. There are steep slopes and ridges

where tanekaha, totara and kanuka are dominant. Elsewhere, kauri, towai and taraire.

Puriri and taraire may predominate in a gully. There are slopes which are mainly towai

mixed with rewarewa and puriri. A ridge may have a predominant stand of rimu. In

some areas, like the view from my window, there is a nice mixture of kaihikatea, rimu,

kauri, totara, karaka, puriri, kohekohe, rewarewa, kanuka, nikau, cabbage trees and tree

ferns. Similar locations are sprinkled with northern rata, and the occasional kawaka, tawa,

pukatea, matai, miro or lancewood.

Some trees, like rimu and kaihikatea, have regular conical forms. Others, such as taraire,

kohekohe and kauri, have a sprawling canopy. This creates variations in light access that

offer opportunities for smaller trees as a second canopy or understorey. Depending on

situation this may include pigeonwood, tree fuchsia, houhere, kowhai, red matipo

(mapou), five finger, pate, hangehange, mamangi and kanuka. On forest margins and in

light wells there is an edge community that may include kumarahou, mingimingi,

kawakawa, poroporo, korokia, hebe, rangiora, wharangi, tree daisy, manuka, taupata,

karamu and other small coprosmas; the bush daphne Alseuosmia ; the N.Z. gloxinia

Rhabdothamnus; cabbage trees of two species and flax. Then, there are all the vines and other plants...

I am deeply alarmed at the number of New Zealand plants we have found that are

marginal or threatened. What are the causes of this serious loss of biodiversity? A

great many of our New Zealand trees are berry producers and have male and female forms:dioecious. Lack of birds to distribute them and gender isolation would be major factors. More than a century of forest clearance and burn offs hit this land hard. Another

factor would be a lack of pollinators: birds, geckos and fruit bats. Scarcity of available

habitat would be another. People developing life-style blocks and wishing to

revegetate could have a major positive effect here if they were aware of the appropriate

plants and their habitat needs. The current trend towards vigorous pest control on the Tutukaka Coast will reap huge benefits for all the pollinators, seed distributors and plants.

One of my green neighbours, to his horror, almost cut down the biggest, most

umbrageous putaputaweta tree I have ever seen, thinking it was a privet. Another, a

great lover of plants, was half way through demolishing a magnificent native kohia passionfruit vine believing it was an exotic, accursed wind-spread moth plant. We New Zealanders are often unfamiliar with many of our finest plants and risk losing them forever as our forests become bird silent; our landscape exotic. The Tutukaka Coast has an immense future as a refugium: an oasis of wildlife belonging to the ancient world of Gondwana.