Thursday, June 17th, 2010
The Working bee scheduled for the Matai Huka on the 6th June was a washout, of course, but I had to go along anyway to tidy up a bit and just in case someone turned up. I should have known Peter Martin would be there and we got to work despite the rain. We started by planting the remaining kowhai near to June Rowland’s Lookout but not close enough to interfere with the view. Then we filled the holes already dug just beyond the stile at the top. We were pretty wet by then so started working our way back down the hill tightening up hare sleeves against the wind and fixing up poorly planted trees. The rain had stopped by then and Hannah Zwartz arrived to help out and take some photos for her gardening column. It didn’t take long for the rain to return but we still got a fair amount done.
It took the Hill Crew and our trusty weekday volunteers the rest of the week to get all the 1600 plants in the ground properly. As with all plantings involving kids there were some trees still in their bags, others debagged but in without putting the soil back and many hare sleeves missing or awry. The good news is that our time up there revealed that last years plantings are doing very well. We have a much lower mortality rate than in previous years due to planting bigger plants and using hare sleeves. We have also diversified what we are planting now that access is easier and we are no longer restricted to planting small plants or transplanting bare root seedlings.
The forecast for the weekend of the 12th was for rain again so we admitted defeat. No one had any dry boots or clothes left! We are back on again this week, though, with a trip to our main planting site on the Ecosite. The Global Volunteers are there today carrying some of the 200 plants up to the top for us. I’ll take up a few more tomorrow so there should be about 250 plants up there but not too much carrying left to do. The forecast for Saturday is better so hopefully we will get a good turnout and get most of them in the ground.
See you on the hill!
Joe