Hinewai Reserve

Okay, so I'm here at Hinewai Reserve, and it’s pretty amazing what they've done with this place. It's a private nature reserve on Banks Peninsula, owned and managed by the Maurice White Native Forest Trust. Apparently, it started as just a 109-hectare piece of farmland back in 1987, but now it's massive, about 1,426 hectares, covered in gorse and regenerating native bush.

The cool thing is, this whole area used to be forested before humans settled here, but a lot of the native stuff was cleared after European colonization. Now, it's rapidly reforesting, and gorse is actually helping out by acting as a "nurse crop" for the new native species. There are over 20 public walking tracks here, including parts of the Banks Peninsula Track.

Hugh Wilson, a botanist, manages the reserve and even hand-writes and illustrates their quarterly newsletter. I heard there was a big fire in 2011 that burned about a third of the reserve, probably from lightning, but by 2017, the native vegetation had regrown really fast, thanks to the gorse helping out. And even after some significant floods in 2021 caused landslips, they're still seeing recovery and growth of gorse and native shrubs. It's a real testament to nature's resilience and some smart management.