After planting hundreds of farm streams with native plants, many practical lessons have been learned by a community group formed at Raglan 21 years ago to reduce the flow of sediment into the harbour.
Their success is evident in the harbour’s clean water and good fishing – a change evident within five years, not the 50 years predicted.
Fred Lichtwark, previously a farmer, fisherman and then voluntary fishery officer at Raglan, was among the founders of the non-profit incorporated society Whaingaroa Harbour Care (WHC), which he has managed since its inception. He says the spin-offs are remarkable.
“The town is buzzing and I am sure if we had kept on the path we were on 20 years ago when the harbour was full of muck and occasionally dead stock washed on to beaches, and no fish to be caught, we wouldn’t have the same tourism and vibrant community we have today.
“It’s all because farmers changed course and took on riparian treatment and planting and it’s incredible.”
The formula was simple: to grow plants from seed in a nursery and then fence and plant stream corridors wide enough, at least seven metres, for adequate bush regeneration.
The result of fencing off 95% of the harbour, requiring 170km of fence, and a further 450km of fence along stream banks and around swamps, has been a dramatic reduction of sediment that previously covered the seagrass beds essential for fish to spawn and feed.
The payback for farmers was seen in WHC’s initial project to fence and plant streams and bog areas in the 140 hectare Wainui Reserve farm park. There, a third of the farm was fenced off but over time the cattle herd was doubled from 70 to 140 head.
Waikato District Council bought the land to give public access to Ngarunui Beach where there is now a surf club, picnic and lookout areas and walking tracks. The farm area was developed by local farmers voluntarily working alongside a property manager to confine livestock to better pasture, lay water lines and protect the streams.
“At the start people had looked sideways at this project because their thinking was that every blade of grass is worth something and you will lose production.”
But the opposite effect was seen when cattle were confined to better pasture that was grazed clean and weeds were no longer a problem.
The cattle today can shelter under manuka over-arching the fences and clean water is pumped into troughs from streams where flax and cabbage trees now slow and filter the flow of flood water.
“At first we were seen as a bunch of greenies and farmers did question the idea that in future they would be expected to fence streams.”
Since then the buy-in of farmers controlling 60% of the riparian edges of land in the Whaingaroa catchment has transformed the harbour.
“Many of our farmers feel good about the aesthetics. For them it’s like working in a park.”
Initially the project asked for volunteers to plant trees sourced from WHC’s nursery on the edge of Wainui farm park. The plants were provided free but as the demand for riparian planting increased a modest charge had to be introduced to cover the costs that included the employment of four full-time workers and one part-timer tending to the nursery and planting out.
This year the cost is $2.50-$3.50 plant in the ground, as well as the cost to farmers of fencing, but there’s been no slackening of demand for WHC planting 100,000-120,000 plants a year “and these farmers are not waiting for some sort of subsidy before starting the job”.
WHC has completed projects such as 100,000 trees above Waireinga (Bridal Veil) Falls near Te Mata and in May will start a project at a Te Pahu dairy farm to plant 31ha of retired dairy pasture, 22ha of gully wetland and 9ha along a stream flowing into the Waipa River.
This wetland restoration with kahikatea forest remnants is being funded by Waikato River Authority to demonstrate to other landowners the benefits of a reduced outflow of sediment, nutrient and bacterial run-off and a restored habitat for native fish and bird life.
Fred, who accepted a Landcare Ambassador Award from NZ Landcare Trust in 2012 on behalf of farmers in the Whaingaroa catchment, says despite his crew having planted more than a million trees there is a lot more work to be done.
Other coastal communities have been encouraged by Raglan’s rapid turnaround, such as the Ruahapia Marae east of Hastings that initially aims to improve their Ngaruroro River catchment by planting 6000 trees to filter and absorb farm run-off.
Fred has spoken at council and marae meetings around the Kaipara Harbour, which extends over almost 1000 square kilometres – double the area of Whaingaroa Harbour – with its southern edge less than an hour’s drive north-west of Auckland.
“Kaipara is going backwards at a great rate of knots so they need to be doing this type of work up there to stop more of their sea grass being covered by sediment.”
A group of West Coast farmers is keen to apply the Whaingaroa method of riparian protection.
“Generally the community, the district councils and farmers all want good riparian management and clean water because it improves their whole economy and environment, which on the West Coast is vital for their tourism business.”
After a four-day tour and several meetings with West Coast farmers asking how waterways could be cleaned up and protected, Fred says he had 30 dairy farmers from Karamea to Hokitika booked for farm visits when local nursery plants become available – and another 12 farms south of Hokitika.
It’s unfortunate, he says, that a similar enthusiasm has yet to take hold among farmers in Waikato where only a handful of dairy farms among the region’s 3536 herds have so far made use of WHC’s riparian planting service, despite Raglan being only a 40-minute drive from Hamilton.
But a lesson learned by the WHC team is to stay focused on farmers positive about a change and not waste time trying to persuade those unwilling to participate.
“We have farmers who see the value and come to us. I had a meeting this morning with a beef farmer saying how much he wants planted next year, all very casual over a coffee in Raglan, and we are fitting in as much we can do for him over the next five years.
“Some still think of us as a bunch of tree huggers and there are farmers who won’t join in for various reasons, some of it due to being leased land, but our experience is that the farms lagging behind are not having a noticeable impact downstream when there’s enough farmers and nature taking up the slack.”
Just 27km over the hill from Raglan, at AgResearch’s former Whatawhata Research Centre, a similar strategy to reduce farm run-off was scientifically assessed after a pine forest was planted, indigenous bush restored, streams fenced and livestock intensified on easier terrain that offered better pasture.
The results, published in 2007, showed a 76% reduction in the export of suspended sediment, 62% drop in total phosphorus and 33% less total nitrogen while water clarity increased, the stream temperature declined and there was more abundant invertebrate life.
Importantly for farmers, the changes also demonstrated an improvement in the research hill farm’s economic surplus per hectare from 30% below the industry average to 13% above.
