Waikato Uni goes bush at Fieldays

Media Release
May 26, 2009

Waikato Uni goes bush at Fieldays

Waikato University spends $12 million a year on environmental research and teaching, but the real stars are Waikato landowners and community groups.

That’s the view of the university’s Chair of Biological Sciences, Professor Bruce Clarkson, who heads several major research projects focusing on bringing bush back into Hamilton city, and restoring lakes, wetlands and small patches of native bush on Waikato farmland.

Waikato University’s projects are highlighted at Fieldays this year where the university is once again a strategic partner. Its site embraces this year’s Fieldays theme, My Land, Our Environment, by showcasing research that contributes to a sustainable environment - something Waikato University has been doing since its inception in the 1960s. A University of Waikato Seminar Series at Fieldays will feature academics and other experts from around the Waikato talking about topics relevant to land-based industries. The university has also just published Research and Innovation: Leading the Way to a Sustainable Future, a document highlighting its research capabilities across all platforms.

Prof Clarkson says the university brings in about $7 million a year in environmental research and consultancy funding, and spends roughly $5 million in teaching on the environment. He says it’s heartening to see rising numbers of students in environment-related studies, and the public’s growing desire to mitigate environmental transformation.

He encourages Fieldays visitors to check out the university’s stand which will feature real samples of Waikato bush and examples of the practical research work being done by staff.

Credit must also go to Waikato landowners, management agencies and community groups, he says. “The real purpose of our research is not research for its own sake – it’s to enhance the biodiversity of the region. All of our research programmes are based on very close relationships with landowners, community groups and local bodies. It’s about our relationship with the community, and that relationship and this work will be intergenerational.”

One of the most successful projects Waikato University is heavily involved in is Waiwhakareke or Horseshoe Lake, near the Hamilton Zoo. It’s an innovative project aimed at using native plantings to reconstruct the original ecosystem, improve the water, and give Hamilton more wildlife corridors. Prof Clarkson says the first plantings were done in 2004 – and already 8.1ha of the 55ha pasture has been replanted.

“That’s amazing, and shows what dedication will achieve. The largest existing native bushland in Hamilton city until now has been Claudelands Bush at 5.2ha,” he says.

“We need to reflect on the scale of the original transformation – if it’s taken 120 years to transform complex ecosystems into a city or farmland, turning it back will take a long time and an investment of funds.” Prof Clarkson says the Hamilton basin, for example, has only 1.6% left of its original natural ecosystem. “That’s as bad as anywhere in the world.”

However the dedication shown by groups helping replant Waiwhakareke shows what’s possible, he says. “In Hamilton city, it’s a reasonable target to think we might end up with 10% of the city back into an ecosystem which is dominated native by plants and animals.” It’s achievable because of the city’s gully system, the river (the largest gully of all) and the Waiwhakareke project, Prof Clarkson says.

University of Waikato scientists are also working with other research organisations, most notably Landcare Research, to determine how best to restore forest fragments – the small patches of native bush amid seas of farmland that are islands of biodiversity. With research, management, pest-control and fencing, they have huge potential for conservation and restoration and will become models for other regions.

Programmes such as Waiwhakareke, restoration of wetlands, the forest fragments and the likes of the pest-proof fence on Maungatautari all have a “synergistic spillover effect”, Prof Clarkson says. “Birds like hihi, extinct in the Waikato for more than 100 years, have been reintroduced to Maungatautari, and major increases in the number of mobile species like tui and bellbirds will help repopulate the wider Waikato, and Hamilton city.”

It’s about carefully choosing where to spend the money, he says. “We could take all the money and spread it across the landscape, but what’s effective is intensively looking after several areas and benefiting from that spillover effect.”

. Prof Clarkson speaks about restoration of native bush and wetlands at 2.30pm on Thursday June 11 during the Waikato University Seminar Series at Fieldays. Topics by other Waikato University speakers over the four days include nitrogen pollution in waterways, learning in cows, and pest fish and river health.

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