This story was originally published in Issue 106 of Open Space, the magazine of QEII National Trust. You can read the full issue on the publications section of our website.

Dawn chorus, deafening

Farmer Bill Garland has had some unusual wildlife experiences, such as finding a kākāpō wandering around his property and once being attacked by a falcon.

The covenantor and former QEII director’s 430-hectare beef and lamb farm, Rahiri, lies next to New Zealand’s largest fenced ecosanctuary, Sanctuary Mountain Maungatautari in Waikato. He shares 8 km of the 47-km boundary fence with the sanctuary and around 30 hectares of his QEII covenanted land lies within the sanctuary.

The keen conservationist was one of the original trustees of the sanctuary. Long before its existence, Bill had QEII covenants on his property and was doing restoration and predator control. His parents established one of the earliest QEII covenants in the 1980s on one of their bush-covered gullies.

“We’ve always done possum control here for many years even before Maungatautari was fenced. We’ve got so many fragments of bush and they are part of the character of the farm,” Bill says.

Nevertheless, the establishment and success of the sanctuary has enriched the experience of Bill and his family on their farm.

“I’ve slept in the bush a couple of times and listened to the dawn chorus, it’s almost deafening, which you never would have heard before. There are saddlebacks outside the fence, North Island robins, tomtits, as well as all the bellbirds, tūī and kererū. We’ve seen an increase in falcons and we’ve got bats pretty much over the whole farm.”

Living in the Halo

Danielle Cameron and her family own a 20-hectare lifestyle block near the Orokonui Ecosanctuary, north of Dunedin. About half is covenanted, including most of the bush-clad area around a stream, and two neighbours have also covenanted their land around the stream.

The numbers of tūī, kererū, korimako, ruru/moreporks and kākā have leapt since the establishment of the sanctuary.

“There are fantails everywhere, which is lovely,” Danielle says. She adds the ethos of the sanctuary fits well with their own organic and regenerative farming practices.

Leonie Rousselot and her partner Hank Rebmann also own a 20-hectare property near Orokonui and have noticed a big increase in native birdlife on their property since the sanctuary fence was completed and predators eradicated in 2007.

“We’ve seen robins in our property, which is really exciting. It’s fantastic to have such a large area of protected native bush with all its wildlife nearby.”

Leonie is less thrilled with the habits of kākā which have spread from the sanctuary. The birds have stripped the bark from macrocarpa trees they have been growing for timber and gouged holes in apples from their trees. However, she remains enthusiastic about the impact of the sanctuary.

Both properties are part of the halo project surrounding Orokonui, which was set up to help protect the native species spilling out of the sanctuary into neighbouring areas. Traps have been installed on their land and Danielle and Leonie are grateful for the work of the volunteers who maintain them.

Neighbours playing their part with a community vision

Don Scarlet, co-chair at Maungatautari Ecological Island Trust (MEIT), the operators of Sanctuary Mountain Maungatautari, says the role of landowners and QEII covenantors is crucial for the success of ecosanctuaries and the halo projects that surround them.

He says Bill Garland’s covenant, located within the sanctuary boundary, gave MEIT the confidence to build the fence in the knowledge the land was permanently protected. Other private land within the fence has also been covenanted.

Covenants in the halo zone outside the fence help anchor conservation efforts in those areas, he adds. These include the B2B (Bush to Burbs) project to create safe wildlife corridors from Maungatautari northwards towards Cambridge and the eco-corridor between Maungatautari and Pirongia Forest Park to the west.

“People see those covenants there and neighbours start thinking they should take part too. Even if they don’t covenant land themselves, they want to do some work to help with the community vision,” Don says.

Bill Garland says there are benefits for covenantors in being part of a broader project or group. The most difficult issue for farmers is not so much the initial capital cost in fencing but ongoing monitoring and maintenance.

The protection work he has done on his farm has always aimed for commercial as well as conservation benefits. Fencing, for example, can be done in a way to make mustering more efficient.

“I also think there’s a huge opportunity in New Zealand agriculture to sell the conservation story because a lot of farmers are doing it and a lot of farmers have increased the biodiversity on their properties and that’s got to be a selling point.”

He says he has treasured the experience of protecting his bush and living next to the sanctuary. Visits by experts and student groups to his property have enriched his own knowledge of nature and his land. “It’s like living next to a university and being able to pop in and out of lectures all the time,” he says.

He must be one of the few farmers to have had an escaped kākāpō wandering his property and even being gashed on the top of his head by an angry falcon wasn’t entirely negative.

“I didn’t mind really. It hurt but it was pretty cool to have a falcon chase you away from its nesting site.”