Super Sites for Conservation Education – Catlins
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Super Sites for Conservation Education – Catlins 1 2 CONTENTS Using this resource 4 Site Maps 5-6 The Catlins: Site Information 7 Pounawea Nature Walk 7 Catlins River Walk 9 Nugget Point Scenic Reserve 11 Pre and Post Visit Activities 14 Site Activities 17 Activity 1: Nature awareness scavenger hunt 17 Activity 2: Getting to know you 18 Activity 3: Who lives here? 19 Activity 4: Changing world 20 Activity 5: Poetry 22 Activity 6: Sign of life 23 Activity 7: True or false 24 Activity 8: Marine reserves 25 Related Resources (including websites) 26 3 USING THIS RESOURCE This resource kit is designed to help you plan exciting and educational conservation learning experiences outside the classroom. It focuses on three sites in the Catlins, chosen for their accessibility and the range of learning experiences they offer. The sites are: • Pounawea Nature Walk • Catlins River Walk • Nugget Point Scenic Reserve For each site, the kit provides background information to introduce you to the key points of interest. A list of other resource material available is included to guide you to more in-depth information. To help you get the most out of your site visit, a range of on-site activities have been suggested, together with ideas for pre and post visit activities. CROSS-CURRICULAR OR SPECIALISED. Sites can be used to meet goals from specific curriculum areas, or different curriculum areas simultaneously. A trip might be planned to meet objectives from the place and environment strand in the Social Studies curriculum, the living world strand of the Science curriculum, and healthy communities and environments from the Health and Physical Education curriculum. Skills and attitudes can similarly be selected from across the range of curriculum documents. Example: Science Curriculum Strand: Making Sense of the Living World – Students could be learning by: Level 1 Making leaf rubbings and prints to closely observe the patterns of leaves. Level 2 Finding out what happens to the wildlife in a forest when the trees are cut down. Level 3 Composing a song, rap, or jingle suggesting possible solutions to the problems faced by an endangered native species. Level 4 Visiting a local forest or bush area to collect data about the impact of people on the area. Level 5 Debating a global conservation issue to develop an awareness of human impacts on the environment. Level 6 Investigating the management of New Zealand’s indigenous forests. Level 7 Debating the impacts of a new mining venture in a national park, taking into account conflicting claims about the effects on people and the environment. 4 In planning your programme, it is recommended that you refer to the Ministry of Education’s Guidelines for Environmental Education in New Zealand Schools. The Guidelines identify environmental education opportunities in the national curriculum statements. Copies are available from Learning Media, Box 3293 Wellington. EDUCATION FOR THE ENVIRONMENT. Take the opportunity to make students aware that the places they are about to visit are part of the heritage of all New Zealanders and therefore the responsibility of all to care for. The Environmental Care Code in the margin is a good resource for reinforcing this point. SAFETY Schools are reminded of the need to prepare a risk analysis and management plan for their visit . Helpful documents include: • Education Outside the Classroom: Guidelines for Best Practice (Ministry of Education, 1995). • Managing Risks in Outdoor Activities (Mountain Safety Manual 27, 1993). • Water Safety Across the Curriculum (Water Safety New Zealand, 2000). 5 Catlins River Walk 6 The Catlins: Site Information High in natural values and rich in diversity, The Catlins provides a wealth of contrasting environments to explore. In places, exposed sea cliffs rise to a height of 200 metres while just around the corner you can find white sand beaches washed by gentle waves or wading birds feeding quietly in a sheltered estuary. This unique mix of landscapes greets you with a wild and rugged welcome one minute and a calm and gentle kia ora the next. At Pounawea and the Catlins River, the welcome falls into the latter category. The Nuggets are definitely on the wild side. Pounawea Nature Walk Pounawea is located on the banks of an estuary fed by the Owaka and Catlins Rivers. The Pounawea Nature Walk, formed mainly for the use of school groups staying at the settlement, takes you through the Pounawea Scenic Reserve. The 38 hectare reserve lies at the edge of the Catlins River Estuary and offers a rewarding combination of tall native forest and contrasting saltmarsh. History Logged in the early days of European settlement, the forest in the Pounawea Scenic Reserve once contained numerous, towering podocarp trees. The term podocarp refers to the family of tall, long-lived but slow growing native trees, such as rimu, totara, kahikatea and miro that can survive up to 1000 years. During the late 1800s, the forests in the Catlins area were extensively exploited for their timber. Kahikatea, the tallest of New Zealand’s trees, growing to 15-30 metres in height, and a lover of fertile, often swampy ground, was eagerly sought by sawmillers for butter boxes and cheese crates because of the wood’s lack of scent. At one time, up to 11 ships would cross the bar on the tide each day to fill their holds with timber cut from the region’s forests. On the opposite side of the estuary, on the site of the yacht club, the “Big Mill” once processed large quantities of wood. Up to 40 workers were employed in the mill. A rock bar, extending beyond the grove of macrocarpa trees on the opposite shore, was formed by ships dumping their stone ballast in preparation for loading the lucrative timber. Now quiet and peaceful, the area shows little sign of the lively sea and timber trades carried on in the late 1800s. Today, Pounawea has a population of only about 100 residents, though numbers rise in summer months when the cribs and camping grounds fill with holiday makers enjoying the area’s inviting tranquillity. Prior to European settlement, the Catlins coast was settled in several places by Maori. These coastal sites show a strong reliance on moa and wild foods of the sea. Pounawea and Papatowhai to the south are two areas that are particularly rich in Maori artefacts. 7 The Forest Today Once logging ceased, the forest slowly recovered. Only a few totara, rimu and kahikatea escaped the axe. These survivors remain as mature trees and can be easily distinguished by their broad trunks and towering height. The main canopy of the forest is now composed almost entirely of kamahi, with rata increasing to the west and south west of reserve. Lower down in the layers is a diverse understorey of: • fuchsia • wineberry • mahoe • coprosma • red matipo and • abundant tree ferns. Crown fern, other ferns and some herb species provide a dense ground cover. On the saltmarsh, the dominant plant species is glasswort, a succulent with distinctive jointed stems. At the upper edge of the marsh there are taller plants such as rushes and a twiggy, small-leaved shrub called shore ribbonwood. Between the marsh and forest is a stand of manuka, flax and tall rushes. The high parts of the marsh are composed of a hard, peaty upper layer in contrast to the sandy base of the lower marsh. From the estuary, you can see how the forest gradually develops from low-lying marsh plants through intermediary shrubs and finally into emergent podocarps. The opportunity to observe coastal forest and adjacent saltmarsh is now very limited as examples of this kind of vegetation sequence have become extremely rare. Birdlife Birdlife is a feature of the reserve. The forest provides habitat for; • tui and bellbird (komako) • grey warbler (riroriro) • tomtit (miromiro) • New Zealand pigeon (keruru). On the saltmarsh: Keruru • migratory godwits (kuaka) feed in flocks on the mudflats in summer, • Royal spoonbills make occasional visits • oyster catchers (torea), white-faced herons and other waders are present the year round. From the road outside the camping ground, you can look north across to Surat Bay, now a common site to view sea lions. The sea lions visiting the area are mostly young males some of which have journeyed from their breeding grounds in the subantarctic Auckland Islands. The sea lions are gradually making a comeback on mainland New Zealand after their numbers were greatly reduced by hunting. They were wiped out by Maori and earlt settlers. 8 Access • A convention centre/camp is available for use by schools visiting the settlement. • Access to the Pounawea Nature Walk is gained from the Pounawea Motor Camp. • Vehicles must be parked outside the camp. • Toilets are available in the camping ground. • The track is easy and well-formed and suitable for all ages. • Allow 45 minutes to get round the track. • Check tides and weather forecast prior to your trip. • You can guide yourself through the numbered pegs on the walkway with the help of the DOC brochure included at the back of this resource. Note: At high tide, the saltmarsh portion of the track is impassable and you will need to retrace your steps through the forest. Catlins River Walk The Catlins River Walk offers the opportunity to traverse exotic pine plantations, silver beech forests and the grassed flats of the “Wisp Run”. A well-formed track follows close to the Rriver most of the way. The track is in several sections, each of which can be walked separately. Numerous bird species can be seen around the waterways of the Catlins River, including: • Little and black shags; • Mallard and grey ducks; • Paradise shelduck; • Black-backed gull; • Fernbird; • White fronted heron; • Kingfisher; and • Pukeko One of the special features of the site is the opportunity to see endangered mohua or yellowhead .