Wiremū St Reserve- Tūrangi
Kids Greening Taupō received funding from Waikato Regional Council in 2024, which allowed us to begin working in Tūrangi. We were excited to start making Tūrangi even more beautiful for people and wildlife! In September 2024 we joined Brenna from Taupō District Council and worked with tamariki from Te Kura O Hirangi and Tongariro School to put almost 150 native plants in the ground in the Wiremū St Reserve. Our coordinator, Rachel taught the students about some of our special native plants, their traditional uses, and how they fit into the ecosystem. The students also enjoyed taking out some big invasive weeds - broom, gorse, cotoneaster, blackberry, and flowering cherries and then having an ice-cream for their hard work!
It was a fun day with a great group of enthusiastic young people. In fact, the tamariki and kaiako from Te Kura o Hirangi were so enthusiastic, that they contacted us a short time later to organise another planting day, this time at their kura.
Then, in Term 4, we all met up again to mulch around the plants to give them a better chance of surviving the spring weed growth and the summer weather. Our coordinators explained to them how mulch helps by smothering weeds, keeping moisture in, and providing nutrients to the plants as it decomposes.
The students enjoyed clearing the weeds around the planting site too. They used loppers to cut down broom, flowering cherry trees, cotoneaster, and other weedy trees. They also pulled out huge amounts of montbretia bulbs that were beginning to smother their plants. The learnt about how garden plants can ‘escape’ by birds eating their berries and pooping them out in native forests, by seeds being spread on the wind, or by garden waste being thrown into reserves. They could see how quickly these plants could take over the space that their native plants needed.
It is so fantastic to see these young people becoming the kaitiaki of this space. Through their mahi they are learning about the importance of our native plants, and about the introduced plants that compete with them.
