In 1966 my Mum and Dad and uncle Alva moved down from Taranaki after buying a farm here in Manakau. It was their chance to get onto their own land after the family had lost some during the Great Depression.
The land here in Manakau was less than ideal, swampy, partially fenced, covered in stumps and regularly flooded but its was what they could afford and they were young, fit and resourceful.
They worked long hours trying to turn that swamp into viable farmland and were mostly successful.
Uncle Alva was a diabetic and eventually he had to leave the farm due to his illness because the work was hard and hours long.
In the 70s Dads cows got nitrogen poisoning which was pretty much un heard of in those days but it had a negative effect on milk production and his cows were dribbling a lot. Superphosphate was the new big thing back then and his farm had some of the lowest land around plus there was a fertiliser works by the pub which was maybe 3 kms east of the farm and in a direct line between the farm and the ocean. There’s no way to know for sure but my guess is Dad got more super than he ever put on his land.
He became a accidental organic farmer and started using seaweed and Dolomite lime, his cows made some recovery and I remember him saying he was needing to use way less penicillin.
One day he showed me the size of the neighbours break, comparing to the one he had just let his cows onto. Look son, similar sized break, similar sized herd, similar quota yet our grass is much shorter. Why do you think that is he asked. I was a teenager and wasn t really interested but looking back i realise that grass was much more nutrient dense even though he had not long stoped using the super
in 1980 my Mum and Dad sold the farm and moved north to easier land but my roots had already grown into the area and before long my Partner Maureen and I bought land only 1 km down the road from the farm with some peat and a little higher ground.
We built a rammed earth house from the sub soil, just the right blend of sand, silt and clay for ramming but the wet peat which was around half the land (3/4 acre) was too wet for sheep and not enough for 2 cows and cows dont like being on their own so we started planting a few cabbage trees and flax and fenced off the wettest area.
After a few years and many visits from my Dad and conversations with some friends and locals it got pretty obvious that we needed to put it back into wetlands. Not a hard decision as it wasn't really much use for anything else and we were not reliant on an income off it.
It's been an interesting experience that now feels very right. Horizons regional council gave us a few hundred plants to help us on our way and the first few flax plantings had frown huge so we could split heaps on plants off them.
My old buddy Bruce Bradley just gave us a heap of Manuka seedlings that I will be planting shortly.
Ive lost count on how many flax we have planted but it's heaps. Kahikatea, Carex, Mingimingi, Totora, Manuka, even a few Pukatea. There is one willow that has appeared which the birds like and I was going to cut this out until I realised the birds had dropped a baby Matai and toara under it. It seems they don’t like the cabbage trees so much so the willow gets to stay for now. I guess the cabbage trees are a bit difficult to navigate for birds.
There’s even a few plants coming up along the fence line which is what got me thinking about the birds and what they bring.
I thought I would try running ropes between the cabbage trees to see if the birds might like sitting on them and dropping some more gifts. Unfortunately some gifts are not welcome like blackberry but we will just have to deal with that as it arises
We called the project kukuwai kia takapu because I believe this area was once called was takapu swamp.
That land really wants to be swamp and we are done fighting it
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