Tapped

Tapped is a film that examines the role of the bottled water industry and its effects on our health, climate change, pollution, and our reliance on oil.

Thanks to spoke for the heads up: http://www.spokemagazine.com/2009/11/tapped-trailer/

Lassie the bird dog

I just got the heads up from @SiroccoKakapo from his twitter feed www.twitter.com/SiroccoKakapo About Richard Henry http://bit.ly/1lFF3t and how he tried (100 years ago!) to protect us from stoats? http://bit.ly/41lbuE

Source: Te Ara

http://teara.govt.nz/en/european-discovery-of-plants-and-animals/6/1

Lassie the bird dog
Richard Henry was an early conservationist who shared many of the concerns of naturalists. His dog Lassie was trained for sniffing out kākāpō (flightless parrots). Many naturalists lamented the decline in bird life and rightly laid the blame on introduced mammalian predators such as rats and stoats. Henry relocated kākāpō on Resolution Island, Fiordland, in the 1890s in an attempt to give them a predator-free haven. He failed, as stoats swam across to the island in 1900 and killed off the birds. But his idea lives on, and many native species today survive only on offshore islands from which predators have been removed.

Whenua Iti slideshow

This slideshow was developed for Whenua Iti Outdoors, to demonstrate its history, philosophy, courses and journeys http://www.whenua-iti.org.nz/ This was recently developed for the opening of its new building and is used on its website as the introduction to the outdoor pursuits centre.

You can follow Whenua Iti Outdoors on twitter here http://twitter.com/whenuaiti

The Man Who Walked Around The World

A fantastic way to demonstrate a historical timeline through video. There is a great simplicity about this film as well.

Thanks to spoke for the heads up: http://www.spokemagazine.com/2009/09/thirsty/

Website shows walking, cycling routes

Great to see Wellington City Council exploring some new web technologies with a mashup of google maps to show where the walking and cycling routes are. It would be really good to see this scaled to the rest of New Zealand

Source: http://www.stuff.co.nz/technology/2883680/Website-shows-walking-cycling-routes

JOURNEY PLANNER: The website shows how steep routes are and how many calories people are likely to burn.

A website showing the best route when walking or cycling between any two points in Wellington, and how long it should take, will go live this morning.

Journeyplanner.org.nz was funded by the Greater Wellington regional council to coincide with World Carfree Day tomorrow, and built by local developer ProjectX.

The website shows how steep routes are and how many calories people are likely to burn.

Little-known tracks and short cuts are included and toilets, drinking fountains and public seating are marked.

“You just type in your starting point and destination and all the navigation is done for you. If you want to make a diversion, it highlights the new route for you and gives you directions,” says council chair Fran Wilde.

At present, the planner does not take into account whether journeys are uphill or downhill when estimating journey times. Spokesman Simon Kennett says the council contributed about $70,000.

Riwaka Resurgence interpretation project

I’ve just been visiting the Riwaka Resurgence; this was the first time I’ve returned here since the orientation and interpretation panels were put into the ground.  For some interpretation projects there can be an extended development period, so it can be fairly exciting to see these panels “in action” after having worked on them some months ago.

It’s always rewarding to see our creations being used – while wandering about the place I had a chance to see how people actually use the panels.

On the interpretation panel, in particular, I can see the white space works well in making the information appear clean and easily read.

I was interested to see the geological panel as well, with the orientation panel as well as interpretation. Not having seen it for a few months I feel it’s worked out well. While you’re in day-to-day involvement with a project you can lose perspective. It’s “hard to see the signs for the trees”. Now with fresh eyes, I can appreciate it for what it is. The information is nicely layered. People read what they like, take snippets and walk on, enjoying their walk interspersed with absorbing information about the resurgence and actually dipping into the river itself.

I was a bit unsure at the time but it’s worked out well. There’s enough of a contrast between  the greys and piping, and the steel piping, far from being visually dominant, has faded into background.

The piping itself has produced a slender structure. It’s not big and bulky like a timber structure would be. After all, it’s not signage that’s intended to be the major feature, but the actual environment itself.

Not only was this the first time I’ve been to this site since the panels were placed, but since that time a mighty matai tree has crashed down at the source of the resurgence. The matai left a gaping hole in the bush canopy. What was a dark secluded resurgence now stands brightly sunlit, exposed beneath a huge hole in the sky. This has had major visual impact at Riwaka, but already, after only a few months of warm weather, the ferns have started to cover the ground and no doubt within a year or so the green will again take over as the bush recovers. At the moment it’s still looking quite raw, a big scar in the sky. It will take a while for the track to recover. There’s a lot of timber that the DoC workers have cut up and moved to the side. This too will take time to rot away.

The Riwaka Resurgence, though, remains a high quality walk close to Motueka and accessible for wide range of people. It’s not quite wheelchair accessible, but a reasonably able-bodied range of people can access the walk, and while the bush recovers from the loss of one of its local giants there will always be something new to see for the regular visitor.

Arrival of the first whio (blue duck) chicks in the Takaka River

This is great news

Friends of the Cobb and the Department of Conservation are celebrating the arrival of the first whio (blue duck) chicks to have hatched in the Takaka River in many years.

The seven ducklings could be a turning point in the battle against stoats, the birds’ main predators.

Friends of the Cobb have caught over 100 stoats in the wider area over the past two seasons in a bid to encourage whio to re-inhabit the river.

Along with Friends of Flora, who carry out similar work around Mt Arthur, the group received funding from the Tasman Environmental Trust’s Cobb Mitigation Fund for the project.

“It’s exciting news that we have a brood of seven blue duckling now about a month old on the Takaka River,” said Alec Milne, a volunteer with Friends of the Cobb.

Mr Milne spotted the whio brood while checking stoat traps in the upper Takaka Valley.

“Kiwi also seem to be on the increase, with several recent reports from the Cobb Valley,” he said.

He believes that intensive trapping in the lower Cobb Valley could be having a wider impact, with low stoat catches in the upper valley and no stoats caught in the Henderson Basin rock wren area this past season.

DOC ranger for threatened fauna Mike Ogle said stoats had decimated whio populations throughout New Zealand.

“Whio are nationally endangered and on the decline except in actively managed areas, where their numbers are increasing,” he said.

Under a DOC whio recovery programme called Operation Nest Egg, whio eggs were taken from nests, and the ducklings raised and re-released last year in specially managed areas, including Rolling River and the Pearce River in Kahurangi National Park.

This week, DOC Golden Bay area office rangers are beginning a full whio survey covering dozens of kilometres of 20 rivers in the park.

The results will be used in conjunction with a survey carried out by the Motueka area office over the past two years.

There are an estimated 2500 whio in New Zealand.

source: Nelson Mail

Draft West Coast regional walking and cycling strategy

The West Coast Regional Transport Committee invites public feedback on the Draft walking and cycling strategy. Submissions close on 19 December 2008.

The strategy vision of the Draft West Coast regional walking and cycling strategy is for more walking, more cycling, more often. More walking and cycling means more transport choice as well as improving the health and well-being of the community. The strategy identifies a range of actions to improve the walking and cycling environment, and seeks to have other strategies, policies, plans and practices support walking and cycling.

The West Coast Regional Transport Committee (RTC) invites public feedback on the Draft walking and cycling strategy. The RTC represents the NZ Transport Agency, West Coast Councils, and the other agencies that have worked together to develop the regional walking and cycling strategy.

Public feedback needs to be returned by Friday 19 December. ago

Source: http://www.nzta.govt.nz/consultation

For more detail information: http://www.nzta.govt.nz/consultation/west-coast-walking-cycling-strategy/draft-west-coast-walk-cycle-strategy.pdf

Video: RSS in Plain English

New 2008 spring range of interpretation displays

We are pleased to let you know we have a new and wider range of interpretation displays that we have been working on over the past few months.

The first two displays, “Explorer” and “Ranger“, are more traditional and can be used for walkway and parkland orientation and interpretation projects. The second two display structures “Coastaleering” and “Vista” are lower profile displays, which are useful when taller display structures can be too intrusive in the landscape.

All of the current display structures use a combination of H4 timber and vinyl on 4mm aluminium panel for outdoor use with “Tough Coat”. We have found this system to be very durable.

For more information and images about these interpretation displays structures, please visit our website or download our Displays Structure Brochure PDF

Any questions please call or email for details.