Today is the last day of Conservation Week. We've had a number of activities on the island - the Mill Creek walk on Monday was postponed until Wednesday which then clashed with a weeding session at Lonnekers that I went to. We spent a couple of hours pulling weeds from around the natives planted last year, fuelled on by some yummy chocolate cake!
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| Lonnekers Beach - looking towards the village |
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| Lonnekers Beach - looking the other way |
I had a lovely walk in the sunshine to the Stewart Island Community Native Plant Nursery on Thursday, arriving just before a hail storm! There's lots of work to do there at this time of year - I pricked out a number of Stilbocarpa lyalli (Punui) seedlings - it's a rare megaherb that can grow to 1m or more but prone to rat and browsing mammal damage.
On Friday I was out with the weeds team hunting barberry - I've been taking my weeds kit (gloves, folding saw and Vigilant gel) when I've been walking and zapping barberry along the roadside. It's a shame that Darwin's Barberry is such a nuisance as it's very pretty when it's in flower, and the birds obviously enjoy eating the berries when they form!
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| Darwin's Barberry in flower |
Conservation Week wraps up this evening with a conservation-theme to the famous Stewart Island Pub Quiz. Quizmaster Extraordinaire, Vicki Coats, featured on Close Up this week and her pub quiz at the South Seas Hotel is a must-see if you are on the island on a Sunday evening.
