Tree hugging...
"And the male spiders are like, 'here, have some sperm.'"
-Lisa, explaining the mating habits of spiders
I have SOOOOO many cool memories I'd like to note in my LJ. And I've got to catch up somewhere. So, I'm starting with March 23rd-- the beginning of my volunteer weekend at
Quail Island. From some of my tramps at Lyttelton, I've been able to see this funny little island in the harbor. We were on a ferry early Friday morning to get to our worksite for the Australearn conservation volunteer weekend program-- "is that it?" I wondered. Once we saw some of the rocks on the shore that faces Lyttelton, my suspicions were confirmed. The funny little island was Quail Island, and being there for a few days was one of my most enlightening experiences in New Zealand.
We were there Friday, Saturday, and most of Sunday. When we arrived at the island on Friday, we got to work almost right away-- by we, I mean Ariel, Erin, Lisa, Shannon, Tamara, and myself, plus Craig, one of the leader guys who is devoted to conservation at Quail Island. We dropped our stuff off at the lil hut where we were staying, and got to work. On the way, Craig showed us a few different trees and things, and I felt the same rush of enthusiasm I used to get on the herpetology trips I used to do for AP Bio. :-) One of the trees he showed us had citrusy scented leaves, which apparently make good tea. Another tree had semi-glossy leaves, which looked rather porous-- the leaves apparently excreted some oils that the Maori actually used as bugspray. So you could rub the leaves on yourself to ward away bugs! There weren't too many bugs on Quail Island, though, so we refrained. :-P Craig pointed out a variety of other plants, explaining with reverance the various properties that made these plants comparable to many of the more popular herbal medicines, saying that there was an abundance of plant life that was basically an untapped market waiting to put NZ plants on the mainstream map.
I guess I don't need to talk about our activities sequentially. For three days, we were engaged in several activities, mosty removal of non-indigenous plants and a bit of tree-planting. The goal of these conservation efforts is to return the island to the way it was before non-indigenous plants (and animals-- like mice and rabbits) basically took over. A lot of progress has been made so far-- for instance, there used to be so many rabbits on the island that some would actually climb trees for food and living space! Rabbits are pretty much erradicated at this point. But the plants are another story. There are a variety of plants that absolutely thrive on the island, but in their rapid growth, are snuffing out the indigenous species. I'm not sure how I feel about this work, actually. I just don't see how the point of it is useful; it's a nice idea, but is it actually accomplishing anything? And even if all the plant life is taken care of, there are some non-indigenous trees that have been there for so long at this point that they deemed worthy of historical protection by the DOC (Department of Conservation). And those trees, as long as they are there, will continue to drop seed and sprout saplings all over the island. This will be an ongoing problem even if the other nonindigeous plants are weeded out (which will take at least fifteen years, Craig predicts).
Well, my judgment aside, there was work to be done. On one patch of the island, there were many nonindigenous plants interspersed with indigenous plants so closely that in order to get rid of them, we needed to cut plants individually, and smear poison on the stumps left behind to kill them while harming as few native species as possible. That was actually our first task, and we completed that early on in the first day, though we repeated it a few other times throughout our stay. At one point, we actually went out to one of the steeper hills on the island, and made our way over the cliffs where plants were growing. I was a little nervous basically danging off of these drops, but eventually I came to trust my feet more, and started using my eyes to scour for plants (instead of looking for safe places to put my feet :-P). I didn't think about it at the time, but it was kind of quasi-superhero-like. Except instead of being Spidey on the lookout for crime, we were defending the island from non-native overgrowth. Yee-haw. :-)
Most of what we did on Friday and Saturday, though, was dig up planting sites. A ton of new native plants had been planted on one side of the island, but they were all in danger. Nonnative weeds were positively swarming around these plants. So, we learned how to identify the native plants in the area (which was easy, because that was mostly things that had been planted by other groups, and they put little patches of carpet around the new plants to give them a better chance at survival). So, for several hours every day, we hacked away with shovels or a tool that mostly resembled a pick.
It was a bit tiring, but not as tiring as I'd expected. Especially since we basically had the time from about 4 or 5 on to ourselves. So, on the first day, the girls and I ventured down to one of the shorelines, which was a bit of pale sand and TONS of bone-white shells. Saturday, we made a lap around most of the island, and then headed towards shore at low-tide, where the water level actually goes down so far that it allows for a passage from Quail Island to another island on foot. So, off we went to "King Billy's Island," named such because some dude named William decided to become a hermit, and lived on this TINY TINY TINY island for about seven years. Go Billy! We didn't hang around for long though-- it was getting dark, AND tide was coming back in. We didn't want to be stranded on King Billy's. :-P
I haven't mentioned much about how awesome the girls were, or how wonderful our sleeping arrangements were. So, first of all, it's fairly easy to find things in common with a lot of people from our program-- apparently the opportunity to study at UC in NZ had a tendency to attract a certain kind of person. Make that a bit more specific by selecting a few interested students to get involved in a volunteer program, and you have an agreeable bunch! These girls appreciated learning and working as much as I did. They were also really easy to talk to-- open minded religiously, with similar spiritual tendencies as mine. Similar political sentiments. Similar appreciations of many of the same sorts of interests, too. We were a compatible crew. :-) On the first night, for instance, it wasn't too cold, and the skies were really clear. We had some bunks inside the hut... but we were so far from light, and with no clouds, it seemed like such a shame to NOT sleep outside. So we all slept under the stars. It was so sweetly serene. It was wonderful.
We got some more work done before we left on Sunday, including tree-planting. It was nice to feel like we'd left some kind of new life behind us, rather than just preserved it by killing other things. :-P After that, Craig took us to a part of the island we'd missed on our little tour-- the leper colonly, LOL! Quail Island housed a small leper colony in the early 1900's, and one of the buildings is still around. We also took the um, less traveled route back to the hut. :-P We did some more impromptu rock-dangling, which let us out on the cliffier side of the island. The fog was just finishing burning off, and from that angle, we could watch it pour out of Lyttelton harbor. We hopped along the shore, which was just a bunch of rocks, and admired the clear blue sky and the strikingly teal water. It was a lovely near-conclusion to our time on Quail Island.
On the way back up, we climbed through one of the areas that was more forested. Plucked out some of the non-native plants we were able to recognize, and fetched our things from the hut to go meet the ferry.
It was a nice experience. It felt good to be involved in something that was meaningful to New Zealand, to DO and not just see/explore. Arriving back at my flat after trips like this always leaves me feeling like a foreigner in my own room. Sleeping with a ceiling over my head? Taking a shower? Flourescent lighting?
...
And yes, for the record, I did see quail.
-Lisa, explaining the mating habits of spiders
I have SOOOOO many cool memories I'd like to note in my LJ. And I've got to catch up somewhere. So, I'm starting with March 23rd-- the beginning of my volunteer weekend at
Quail Island. From some of my tramps at Lyttelton, I've been able to see this funny little island in the harbor. We were on a ferry early Friday morning to get to our worksite for the Australearn conservation volunteer weekend program-- "is that it?" I wondered. Once we saw some of the rocks on the shore that faces Lyttelton, my suspicions were confirmed. The funny little island was Quail Island, and being there for a few days was one of my most enlightening experiences in New Zealand.
We were there Friday, Saturday, and most of Sunday. When we arrived at the island on Friday, we got to work almost right away-- by we, I mean Ariel, Erin, Lisa, Shannon, Tamara, and myself, plus Craig, one of the leader guys who is devoted to conservation at Quail Island. We dropped our stuff off at the lil hut where we were staying, and got to work. On the way, Craig showed us a few different trees and things, and I felt the same rush of enthusiasm I used to get on the herpetology trips I used to do for AP Bio. :-) One of the trees he showed us had citrusy scented leaves, which apparently make good tea. Another tree had semi-glossy leaves, which looked rather porous-- the leaves apparently excreted some oils that the Maori actually used as bugspray. So you could rub the leaves on yourself to ward away bugs! There weren't too many bugs on Quail Island, though, so we refrained. :-P Craig pointed out a variety of other plants, explaining with reverance the various properties that made these plants comparable to many of the more popular herbal medicines, saying that there was an abundance of plant life that was basically an untapped market waiting to put NZ plants on the mainstream map.
I guess I don't need to talk about our activities sequentially. For three days, we were engaged in several activities, mosty removal of non-indigenous plants and a bit of tree-planting. The goal of these conservation efforts is to return the island to the way it was before non-indigenous plants (and animals-- like mice and rabbits) basically took over. A lot of progress has been made so far-- for instance, there used to be so many rabbits on the island that some would actually climb trees for food and living space! Rabbits are pretty much erradicated at this point. But the plants are another story. There are a variety of plants that absolutely thrive on the island, but in their rapid growth, are snuffing out the indigenous species. I'm not sure how I feel about this work, actually. I just don't see how the point of it is useful; it's a nice idea, but is it actually accomplishing anything? And even if all the plant life is taken care of, there are some non-indigenous trees that have been there for so long at this point that they deemed worthy of historical protection by the DOC (Department of Conservation). And those trees, as long as they are there, will continue to drop seed and sprout saplings all over the island. This will be an ongoing problem even if the other nonindigeous plants are weeded out (which will take at least fifteen years, Craig predicts).
Well, my judgment aside, there was work to be done. On one patch of the island, there were many nonindigenous plants interspersed with indigenous plants so closely that in order to get rid of them, we needed to cut plants individually, and smear poison on the stumps left behind to kill them while harming as few native species as possible. That was actually our first task, and we completed that early on in the first day, though we repeated it a few other times throughout our stay. At one point, we actually went out to one of the steeper hills on the island, and made our way over the cliffs where plants were growing. I was a little nervous basically danging off of these drops, but eventually I came to trust my feet more, and started using my eyes to scour for plants (instead of looking for safe places to put my feet :-P). I didn't think about it at the time, but it was kind of quasi-superhero-like. Except instead of being Spidey on the lookout for crime, we were defending the island from non-native overgrowth. Yee-haw. :-)
Most of what we did on Friday and Saturday, though, was dig up planting sites. A ton of new native plants had been planted on one side of the island, but they were all in danger. Nonnative weeds were positively swarming around these plants. So, we learned how to identify the native plants in the area (which was easy, because that was mostly things that had been planted by other groups, and they put little patches of carpet around the new plants to give them a better chance at survival). So, for several hours every day, we hacked away with shovels or a tool that mostly resembled a pick.
It was a bit tiring, but not as tiring as I'd expected. Especially since we basically had the time from about 4 or 5 on to ourselves. So, on the first day, the girls and I ventured down to one of the shorelines, which was a bit of pale sand and TONS of bone-white shells. Saturday, we made a lap around most of the island, and then headed towards shore at low-tide, where the water level actually goes down so far that it allows for a passage from Quail Island to another island on foot. So, off we went to "King Billy's Island," named such because some dude named William decided to become a hermit, and lived on this TINY TINY TINY island for about seven years. Go Billy! We didn't hang around for long though-- it was getting dark, AND tide was coming back in. We didn't want to be stranded on King Billy's. :-P
I haven't mentioned much about how awesome the girls were, or how wonderful our sleeping arrangements were. So, first of all, it's fairly easy to find things in common with a lot of people from our program-- apparently the opportunity to study at UC in NZ had a tendency to attract a certain kind of person. Make that a bit more specific by selecting a few interested students to get involved in a volunteer program, and you have an agreeable bunch! These girls appreciated learning and working as much as I did. They were also really easy to talk to-- open minded religiously, with similar spiritual tendencies as mine. Similar political sentiments. Similar appreciations of many of the same sorts of interests, too. We were a compatible crew. :-) On the first night, for instance, it wasn't too cold, and the skies were really clear. We had some bunks inside the hut... but we were so far from light, and with no clouds, it seemed like such a shame to NOT sleep outside. So we all slept under the stars. It was so sweetly serene. It was wonderful.
We got some more work done before we left on Sunday, including tree-planting. It was nice to feel like we'd left some kind of new life behind us, rather than just preserved it by killing other things. :-P After that, Craig took us to a part of the island we'd missed on our little tour-- the leper colonly, LOL! Quail Island housed a small leper colony in the early 1900's, and one of the buildings is still around. We also took the um, less traveled route back to the hut. :-P We did some more impromptu rock-dangling, which let us out on the cliffier side of the island. The fog was just finishing burning off, and from that angle, we could watch it pour out of Lyttelton harbor. We hopped along the shore, which was just a bunch of rocks, and admired the clear blue sky and the strikingly teal water. It was a lovely near-conclusion to our time on Quail Island.
On the way back up, we climbed through one of the areas that was more forested. Plucked out some of the non-native plants we were able to recognize, and fetched our things from the hut to go meet the ferry.
It was a nice experience. It felt good to be involved in something that was meaningful to New Zealand, to DO and not just see/explore. Arriving back at my flat after trips like this always leaves me feeling like a foreigner in my own room. Sleeping with a ceiling over my head? Taking a shower? Flourescent lighting?
...
And yes, for the record, I did see quail.