| Leader | Mentor | Understudy | Tail Ender | |
| Whole Group | Nicky/Norma | Norma | Judy | Ali/Eric |
Were this report to be only one word, it would have to be ‘variety’: a variety of weather; a variety of activities; a variety of plants; a variety of road conditions; a variety of tracks; and variety in our return route to Bishopdale Mall car park.
On a beautiful, sunny, winter’s morning, a group of over 30 planter trampers gathered at Bishopdale Mall car park to board our coach bound first for Princess Margaret Hospital to pick up the balance of our 47 trampers for the day’s activities. However, our trip to PMH was very slow because we ‘copped’ every red light on the way and long queues at some of those lights so there were a few lights’ phases before we got through. We did not arrive at PMH until after 9.00 am to be met by a group of rather cold trampers because the weather there was 100% grey overcast.
The coach driver, Viktor, then took us up Hackthorne Rd and Dyers Pass Road to the planting site in Thomson’s Reserve – the first time that the club had been tree planting there was in 2001. The latter part of that short drive had its challenges! Because of extensive road works, including two further (temporary) red lights, Viktor had quite a challenge negotiating the red cones forming a single-lane slalom to the Sign of the Kiwi corner – spontaneous applause broke out at this point to mark Viktor’s success. In the cloud around the parking area on the Summit Road at 10.00 am, we were met by three city park rangers who had, on the previous miserable day, prepared the planting site. As a result of their efforts, 420 seedlings of various native species were waiting for our tender planting efforts. After a demonstration on how to dig a hole and plant a seedling by the ex-Glaswegian of the ranger trio, armed with spades, we took to slope with gusto.
At each appointed planting spot, there was a bare, fairly flat spot, a seedling in a pot, a cardboard rectangle, three stakes and protective netting. The soil was damp enough to be dug reasonably easily, except if one struck an odd stone or two. After carefully placing the seedling, and back-filling the hole, the cardboard rectangle was placed around the plant’s stem and covered with mulch. There was a difference of opinion among our supervisors over the better way to lay the two available mulches: dead grass first with commercial bark mulch on top or vice versa. After 50 minutes, the lead ranger, Fiona, who is well known to club members, said we could have a break for ‘smoko’ (not a commonly used term in this non-smoking age!) and though some accepted the invitation immediately, others were determined to finish the planting at the first position before taking a break and stayed till that was achieved. During the planting, the grey cloud began to break up a bit and some faint rays of sun returned. After the non-smoking ‘smoko’, planting resumed at a spot slightly higher up the slope. Within 30 more minutes all plants were firmly in the ground – 420 plants in 1.5 hours compared with 2020, when, under Covid-19 restrictions of only two groups of 10 planters could work, a similar number of plants took 4 hours work to plant them. The plants were all eco-sourced, which means that they had been produced from plants growing naturally in the ecological area of the Port Hills. There were 18 indigenous species among the 420 plants, including four species of Coprosma. We also planted some specimens of the widespread endemic kanuka species, Kunzea robusta (botanical taxonomists now recognise 10 species of kanuka in this genus; all of them have a ‘Threatened’ status, seven are ‘Nationally Vulnerable’ and three are ‘Critical’). The tree seedlings planted were totara, Podocarpus totara. Those club members who have been on a number of tree-planting days commented favourably on how well some of their previous efforts had succeeded. Cabbage trees (tῑ kōuka, Cordyline australis) certainly seemed to have made significant progress.
The ’work’ part of the day complete, as one large group led by Nicky, we went round the west side of Sugarloaf and down to the Sign of the Kiwi, which is currently closed because of the road works. However, all the outdoor seating and tables were there so we spread out to have an early lunch and enjoy the weather that was continuing its improvement until the cloud returned. Back across the road, we followed the track round the south side of Sugarloaf and continued eastwards along the Crater Rim Track towards Mt Vernon. At this point, we had a ‘high road’ and a ‘low road’; Norma took the Alternatives on the low road while the Standards took the ‘high road’ to Mt Vernon’s summit. The two groups coalesced again for a while on the sloping track down from the Summit Road before another ‘low road, high road’ split. As on the first occasion, and unlike the well-known Scottish song, the low roaders got to the destination first, but as was overheard on the coach (in another context) “It’s the journey not the destination”.
But the day’s variety was not yet finished. After dropping off the PMH group, we were taken to see where our coach spends its time while not taking people around. Viktor loudly tooted the bus’s horn to his colleagues as we passed the Leopard coach depot in a road probably few of us had ever travelled on. Txt courtesy of Eric & Margaret
