This article was first published in the Tararua Tramper Volume 90, no 4, May 2018
Medium trip on Duntulm Farm, Mangatārere Valley
March 28th, 2018
It was a pleasure to welcome five other TTC trampers to our 250 Ha piece of wilderness at the edge of the Tararua Forest Park. A damp scramble across the Mangatārere Stream, then a short walk along farm tracks, through regenerating beech, hebe and mānuka took us to homemade biscuits at our little home – a luxury version of a tramping hut. The morning showers didn’t bother us as we went up a narrow walking track, past rimu and matai (one with a circumference of over 4m) that had escaped the logging of early 20th century, emerging to views north to Mt Holdsworth and east across to the Aorangi Range. We ate lunch by some pig rooting in long grass before returning to the bush. This section was along an old logging track that has become overgrown. Miro, fuchsia, rata and many more species alternately delighted us and impeded our progress. The last hour was downhill on a farm track, passing sites for beehives used to extract high-grade mānuka honey.
Much of the property was grazed until we bought it and now regenerating bush is earning carbon credits with that part of the land covenanted in perpetuity. We now have an ambitious plan to make it predator-free, enhance the numbers of birds and lizards and hopefully reintroduce some species. This will involve a lot of monitoring and trap placement and maintenance plus a couple of new walking tracks. We certainly welcome volunteers from June onwards and have a basic cabin that sleeps four available.
- Party members
- Paul Bruce, Carol Kelly, Liz Martin, Alastair Nicholson (joint leader and scribe), Jan Nye, Celia Wade-Brown (joint leader and scribe), Warwick Wright .