Ecosystem Design

Where are we?

We are choosing to live out of town in a very special area, near the head of the Maraetotara river valley in Hawke’s Bay, New Zealand at approx. 350m above sea level. 

The valley is within the cape to city native bird corridor and is only a few minutes from Waimarama Beach. There are many beautiful limestone outcrops and several native bush remnants and conservation area’s, it is also farming country with deer, cattle, sheep and goats all farmed in the valley.

Regenerating native bush from pasture 

The planting of Nga Kereru is for our family, friends and the local wildlife to enjoy while we are custodians of this land and for the benefit of future generations.

We started planning for the planting immediately after purchase of the land in 2016, with site specific advice sought from Ewan MacGregor (Hawke’s Bay Regional Council – native forest regeneration), Marie Taylor (Plant Hawke’s Bay – native plant nursery) and Anna Archibald (local planting services).  It was too late for us to order the seedlings needed for the 2016 planting season, so we focused on ordering our plants in 2016 to start planting in the 2017 season. 

If you have a significant area to plant that is clear of your future building site, our advice regarding planting is to do it before rather than after building.  We feel it should be prioritised as one of the first investments rather than an afterthought to be funded with whatever time and money is left over from the house build, this is most often nothing... 

The initial Nga Kereru planting programme spanned three years 2017 - 2019 to re-establish native forest on what was pasture and setup orchard and garden areas for food production.  Two thousand, five hundred native trees and shrubs have been planted in these three seasons.  Season three completed the initial native planting programme and established the orchards and gardens.  In subsequent years we will add additional native species, for the forest understory and ground cover, that require the shade of the canopy that has been established by the initial three-year planting programme.

We are using seedlings from Plant Hawke’s Bay of local species/varieties sourced from locally collected seed stock. 

This ensures that the planting is truly local native.. and will integrate with existing native forest remnant’s and conservation forest reserves in the Maraetotara valley.

Season one planting was completed by Anna Archibald and her team, with an excellent 99% strike rate, but unfortunately she was unable to continue working with us for season’s two and three – we thank her very much for her contribution. 

Guy Morris from GB Landscapes has taken over our planting. 

He and his team did an excellent job in 2018 and 2019, and with his permaculture background has supported us with both native planting and our orchard/vegetable planting.

The Maraetotara valley is populated, like much of New Zealand’s grazing land, with many Rabbits and Hares.  Some of the Hares are the size of dogs (no kidding), they don’t like surprises and so want to have an un-interrupted view – any new plantings are therefore likely to be sniped off at ground level by the hares if unprotected. 

We have used bamboo staked combi-guards around each plant, in combination with weed mats to give the seedlings a chance as the property is no longer grazed and they have to compete with aggressive grass, tussock and weed regrowth. 

We are tackling variegated thistles and other weeds with the grubber and scrub bar and are doing releasing after each planting to make sure our seedlings are not swallowed by pasture and weed regrowth before they have a chance to get established.

We have not needed to use irrigation yet, although it is available if required in a severe drought.  In re-establishing native forest at Nga Kereru we are intervening as little as possible to encourage survival of plants suited to this location and deep rooting of the trees as we are in a high wind zone.  Nga Kereru has great topsoil and free drainage and with good planting seasons in 2017, 2018 and 2019 the strike rates have been excellent.  Any damage that has arisen is from rapid growth followed by strong winds breaking the saplings, and we have found these tend to recover naturally with new growth if left to their own devices. In 2020 we experienced drought, common in Hawkes Bay but uncommon in how it impacted the head of the Maraetotora river valley, our 2019 plantings were impacted and we experienced some losses, nature has its way and no doubt the plants that survived this season will be stronger for it.

If you are interested in the possibilities of regenerating native bush from marginal farmland, and we hope you are.. take a look at this amazing, heartfelt and inspiring short film…

Orchards and Gardens

Our goal is to be as self-sufficient as possible with fruit and vegetable production at Nga Kereru.  Seasonal food is being preserved for off season enjoyment and sharing with friends and family – regular food swaps with our neighbours increase the diversity of our food supply, but we also welcome dining in tune with the local seasons rather than sourcing foodstuffs out of season through global supply chains.

As noted above the 2019 planting season (July-Aug) established our orchards for food supply and in spring 2019 and summer 2020 the vegetable and herb gardens are being established in their final site.

Our orchards are situated on the west facing slopes of our two main gullies, which are relatively frost free, enjoy passive irrigation from stormwater water runoff and have some shelter from the prevailing winds.  Both gullies run to the north and receive plenty of sun. The first gully has been planted with fruit trees and the second gully primarily with nuts.  The second gully is also the location of the waste system discharge field with a steady supply of nitrogen laden grey water to this area. Our orchard planting is spaced and complimentary, rather than in orderly rows of single species with permaculture principles actively applied to minimise toxic inputs.

In addition to our gully orchards, a small grove of olive trees has been planted on the North Face of our property to take maximum advantage of the sites solar gain, and we have also planted a small number of citrus trees (lemons, limes and mandarins), feijoa’s and table grapes in close proximity to the house for ease of access to them.

Our vegetable gardens were established initially in the spring of 2018 using raised beds and planters situated near the caravan site during the house build phase – so we could learn from experience what works and what doesn’t in our micro climate.

The 2019/2020 and onwards.. (post house building) location of the vegetable and herb garden beds is in the south eastern corner of the property, which had a big mound of top soil from the building site on top of it during the build.  This location has great all-day sun, easy access from the house site, an established water supply, great natural drainage, has now been levelled with fill from the building site and has the beautiful black top soil of Nga Kereru restored on top.

With local rabbits, hares and birds in abundance the gardens require protection, so a combination of fine fibre mesh and chicken wire is being used to enclose all of the garden beds.

Frosts and snow (once every couple of years) are also an issue at 350m above sea level so varieties that can handle the local climate have been chosen, as well as employing frost mitigation strategies for some orchard and garden plantings.

We have planned siting a bee hive in one of the orchard gullies to support orchard and native tree pollination, with a spin-off benefit of supplying Nga Kereru with fresh comb and honey, but our neighbour already has several hives and these should take care of our pollination needs for the immediate future.

Water

Our water supply is a combination of potable spring water and rainwater from roof collection. 

The spring water reticulation was trenched and plumbed in at the same time that the 30,000-litre rainwater tank was sited and the NaturalFlow NF8000 waste system was installed in early 2017.  The spring water supply can top up the rainwater tank during droughts and feeds irrigation lines with risers and taps spread across the property. 

Spring water is being used for irrigation (all our outside taps) and for our drinking water - it’s wonderful to drink as it’s naturally alkaline.  Rainwater is used to supply the hot water heating system, and so is used for cooking, and in particular showering and bathing as it is naturally more acidic which is excellent for the skin. 

Manifolds are setup at both the rainwater tank pump shed and at the house, so our water supply can be switched across in the event of issues with either the rainwater or spring water supply.  For example, the rainwater supply to our house for hot water is normally dependent on a pump, but if we have a power outage the spring water, which has great pressure from its gravity supply head far above the property, can be switched over to supply all of our water needs at mains pressure until power is restored.

Rainwater from the house roof flows through an incoming maelstrom filter system into our 30,000 litre rainwater tank and is pumped back up to the house at mains pressure.

We have chosen to build a dry stormwater system, meaning that the downpipes and stormwater pipes through to the tank empty out, by gravity, after each rain event, rather than a wet system where water sits in the pipes. There are pro’s and con’s of wet and of dry plumbing for rainwater harvesting, it pays to research on the internet and talk to people early on and then chose the one which works best for your circumstances, its a foundational decision.

A supply side Puretech G9 filtration system is setup at our rainwater tank, with passive and active elements – the passive elements being a pair of large cartridge filters and the active system being ultraviolet light treatment.  This is focused on the rainwater side of the water system as it is more likely to become contaminated due to organic matter, but if spring water is directed into the water tank or diverted back to the house from the pump shed through manifold switching it will also pass through the supply side filtration system.

Our stormwater overflow is piped across the contour from our rainwater tank into our stormwater gully, which has engineered culverts and drains directing the stormwater to a ponding area below Nga Kereru.

Wastewater is treated through our NaturalFlow NF8000 system. 

This system is entirely gravity fed and uses worms (vermiculture) to process our black water and solids before discharging along with the grey water into the dosing field in the orchard. 

All toilets are standard flush type and as the worms love most things organic an insinkerator could be used in the kitchen – however our preference is to compost our kitchen waste and/or feed it to the chickens.