FuturEcology & EmGuard ™ September 2023 update.
Spring has sprung!
By Emma Fryer
The longer days and sunshine have been a real treat. An indication of what is to come.
We have had a good month here at FuturEcology. We celebrated the end of our planting season with a well-deserved beer and charcuterie after getting almost 65,000 plants in the ground. We couldn’t be happier with how the planting season went and we would like to take the opportunity to thank everyone in the team for their hard work and commitment to ‘saving the planet one tree at a time’. We have a busy maintenance season ahead and are looking forward to cracking into it.
We hope you have all had a good month and are enjoying the warmer weather. Don’t forget to turn your clocks forward this Sunday and enjoy the birds chirping a little earlier.
Sunrise up Mt Robert , Nelson Lakes NP
Pocket Restoration Aotearoa - What's Your Why?
FuturEcology is proud to have developed an App aimed at making environmental restoration accessible to all skill levels. In this video, we interviewed Nath from North Nelson, who is doing a fantastic restoration project, about what motivates him.
Mandy’s Update:
By Mandy Richards
I’m a sucker for an adventure. So, when my friend Kirsty came up with the idea of the GRaP 360 (biking the Old Ghost Road and Paparoa as a loop) my fear of missing out kicked in and I said yes!
So, four of us set off from Nelson just after 5 am, driving to Lyell to begin riding the Old Ghost Road. Four days, 360km and 360 degrees later we rode back into Lyell. (Not as coincidental as it sounds - it so happens that all loops are 360 degrees!). We stayed at the Seddonville Pub, Punekaiki Beach Hostel and the Blackball Inn and ate oodles of homemade muesli bars and cheese, cream cheese, and pickle sandwiches.
The best bits were the novelty of riding my bike in the alpine environment, visiting three great very small towns, the sensational West Coast bush and coastline and bush, the funny stories and conversations you have after 10 hours in the saddle. The Blackball Inn breakfast was unanimously the best meal.
How lucky are we? Wherever you live in New Zealand, whatever your buzz, there is an adventure waiting to be had…
Alvin’s Update
By Alvin Bartley
After 3 exciting months abroad, it is time to get stuck into things back home!
I have been lucky enough to have 3 months away exploring Morocco, Southern Spain, Portugal and England. The trip has included a 1-month artist residency in Porto, meeting my niece and hanging out with my nephew in Cornwall as well as time for travelling and exploring and what a blast it has been.
Throughout the trip, it has been really evident talking to people how far our environmental practices have come back home in New Zealand. Although we still have a long way to go, I felt a strong sense of pride explaining to people about the work we are doing in the environmental space.
I am excited to jump back into our existing projects and start getting stuck into some new planning and design work with a revised sense of enthusiasm and excitement.
Young Enterprise Alumni Awards
Finalists Emma Fryer & Marina Kere from Nelson
By Emma Fryer
Last week I was lucky to have attended the Young Enterprise Alumni Awards as a finalist in the environmental leader category.
It was such a privilege to be in a room filled with so many inspiring people who are making a huge positive impact in their chosen fields.
Rachel Taulelei was the overall winner in the Alumni Awards. Her Māori heritage and advocacy for young entrepreneurs, and in particular women, are among her most passionate inspirations. I so enjoyed the opportunity to talk to Rachel, and to find out that she has used EmGuards.
Well done to all those who were nominated and those who won. The future is in our hands, let’s make it count.
Shout out to Redstone Golf Course
By Emma Fryer
I have thoroughly enjoyed learning to play golf over the last couple of months. It definitely isn’t as easy as it looks and I have been humbled by the fact that I can’t hit the balls far enough to lose them. But I am loving it none the less.
I recently went to Redstone golf course and so enjoyed my day there. The trees and daffodils were lovely and the creeks throughout provided an extra challenge.
If you are in the area with your golf clubs, I would highly recommend stopping by. Norman and Bo have created a great spot.
EmGuard fastened with old golf club
Our Drone
By Alvin Bartley
We are excited to introduce our new drone, which Shaun is looking forward to using. This is going to be a really useful tool to support our planning and design work, specialist weed control and to capture the progress of our field work across all our sites.
With the drone we will be able to create photomosaics, 3D surfaces as well as thermal maps. We can't wait to take this out to our sites and get ourselves familiar with this tool, and use this information to support what we do.
My Favourite Tools
By Jan Fryer
There is no doubt that the right tool for the job makes life so much easier and a job much less challenging. A tool that starts when you want it to, is my number one priority!
I was in my happy place last night when I got home from work, strapped on my battery weedeater and headed out into an area of our property that the family always refers to as “ the land that time forgot”. Basically in reference to the fact that it used to grow lots of long grass and weeds and it would be a major challenge to get it back to the park like garden I had always envisaged it should look like.
I now have no excuse though, as I have a wonderful array of tools to help keep it looking good.
My favourite shop in Nelson is the Stihl shop (plug here for Isaac and Michelle Russell who provide wonderful service). During the weekend they held a road show, showcasing many of the great tools on offer, plus some new and exciting ones coming onto the market.
Battery tools are going ahead in leaps and bounds. I so recommend battery tools. When the mood hits me to go and do something in the garden (not necessarily a regular occurrence) like the weedeating, as mentioned, and provided the batteries are charged, I can head out, grab the tool, strap it on, push the button and away I go. No more thousand pulls on the cord. I got the lawns mowed as well with the battery mower. What a dream machine that is - it even pulls itself along so there’s no more pushing a great heavy mower over our uneven hillside.
At the roadshow I managed to get a new grasshead for the weedeater. How many of you have had the frustration of the nylon breaking off or wearing down in mid job. It is quite a mission to get the nylon back into the spool and feeding out smoothly. This new head was a revelation.
The nylon comes in pieces about 15cm long and you just push these into the 2 metal holes on the side of the head, one each side and they grip in there and away you go. When they wear down, you just pull the little remaining bit out from underneath, thread a new piece in and away you go again. What a brilliant idea.
So with spring well here and the grass growing madly, enjoy getting out there and whipping your place into shape. I definitely recommend going to see what great new tools are being released to make the job easier.
STIHL DUROCUT 5-2 MOWING HEAD (FS 38 / FS 45 / FSA 60 /FSA 86)
PRODUCT CODE: 4006 710 2131
Weed of the month:
Grass: Why grass suppression is essential in restoration planting
By Anna Bradley
Grasses and other ground covers compete for nutrients and soil moisture around the base of new plants.
Grass is not just a problem for new plantings, it can also prevent any natural regeneration on a site because the biochemical and fungal composition of grasslands and pasture differs significantly from forested areas.
The goal when preparing for planting is to establish a good clear planting space for each new plant, and then to nurture their growth to achieve canopy cover as quickly as possible.
Canopy cover will shade out any grass between your plantings, and then you should start seeing natural regeneration occurring once the grass cover diminishes over time.
The difference between spray damage and frost at this time of year
By Anna Bradley
Last month after a succession of heavy frosts in mid-August we noticed that there were a lot of dying/damaged one and two-year old plantings in the Hira Reserve. A question we received from one of our clients was how do you tell the difference between frost and spray damage to plants?
If the plant has been accidently sprayed, you would also expect to see dieback in the surrounding area. If plants are guarded and spray is carefully applied under the right conditions, it reduces the risk of spray drift occurring that can kill plants. Also, be very careful about what spray you use, as some will travel through the soil and can damage plants.
It is important to select the right plants for the site/conditions. For example, species such as akeake, wineberry and Coprosma robusta are only semi-frost hardy and ngaio are frost tender. Whilst these are great species to use in ecological restoration projects, if your site is prone to hard frosts, it may be worth considering using more frost hardy species in the mix or accept you may lose a few species to frost.
The EmGuard offers some protection against frosts in the first year but once plants burst out of the guard in year two, they are at an increased risk of frost damage until they fully established around 4 years.
Frost damaged akeake
Coprosma robusta – it is not uncommon for the leaves to take on a purplish-tinge after a frost, but it will recover
Interesting Snippets
Image courtesy of bbcgoodfood.com
Recipe - One Pan Coconut Dahl
by Emma Fryer
If you are looking for an easy and affordable dinner, we highly recommend this one pan dahl. Both gluten free and vegan, so it is perfect if you are catering for those with dietary requirements.
It has been a real hit in our flat this last month!
What we’ve been reading
By Robert Fryer
How to watch a bird. By Steve Braunias.
This is a great short read. It is now out of print but if you are lucky you may be able to find a copy in a second-hand bookshop.
The story basically outlines his exploration of birding in New Zealand and talks about the different types of birdwatcher, from the English styled Twitchers to the NZ birders who, like their subjects, tend to flock and enjoy the social interaction of birding.
He has a great sense of irony and describes NZ’s first books on Ornithology, Walter Buller’s, Bullers Birds, being one. In this Buller, gives a lovely account of watching a particular bird, describing the beauty of its plumage in detail and then shooting it for addition to a museum’s collection. Buller must have accounted for many hundreds of birds in his “research”.
I think this book is important as it celebrates the more common species we take for granted in our urban environments. We need to be careful to ensure that those birds we take for granted today, are still with us tomorrow. I remember only 30 years ago walking up onto Jenkins Hill behind Nelson and being captivated by the number of Kakariki in the forest. The yellow crowned Parakeet was once common in Nelson’s beech forests but I have not heard one in my travels for a long time now.
This book was read on National Radio several years ago so maybe available as a podcast from RNZ.
This year seems to be steaming along, which is a little scary but make the most of the month ahead and enjoy the longer days, it’s almost BBQ season!
Happy planting!
Here’s to saving the planet one tree at a time.
If you have any photos or stories you would like to share, we would love to hear from you.
