For the first time, some staff members from ASB’s Technology Architecture team had their volunteer day at CUE Haven and helped us with some important planting work.  The team arrived first thing in the morning and included Charlotte, Christie, Daniel, Henk, Manuela, Marvin, Mike, Ping, Shane and Steven.

Everyone was new to CUE Haven so we took some time to get acquainted over morning tea.  Mahrukh gave an introduction to the CUE Haven project and the plans for the future.

Thomas then gave a safety briefing and a description of the work planned for the day.

The plan was to plant pioneer trees in several areas that needed to be filled in to provide a canopy for bigger trees and also to plant harakeke and ti kouka in an area where the tree cover had been lost in the heavy rainstorms in 2023 that caused a large slip which has now stabilized.

We had earlier prepped the planting areas by spraying out the kikuyu grass that had grown over and was preventing trees from getting established.

We drove up to the planting area and Thomas repeated the safety briefing and gave a planting demonstration. 

The first task was carrying the plants to the various planting sites.

The team spread out throughout the planting site and went to work. 

Today’s planting included manuka, kanuka and mahoe.

The team worked in a variety of areas and different terrains.

Even a broken arm didn’t slow them down!

We requested the team to search out any areas that needed to be filled in and they weren’t shy about exploring.

One challenge the group faced was clearing away thick dead kikuyu grass in areas that had been sprayed out, but they had no trouble coping.

As one area was planted out, they moved to new spaces that needed to be filled in.

It wasn’t long before there were more empty trays than full ones!

It wasn’t quite lunchtime when the group finished off the planting at the top of the property.  The team then moved down to plant harakeke and te kouka trees to revegetate and stabilize the area where there had been a major slip after last year’s rain storms.

Thomas gave a safety briefing about planting in the area.

The group still had enough energy and kept smiling while planting all the trees in the challenging terrain.

When all the trees had been planted, the team gathered up all the gear and headed back to the nursery to clean up.

We then had a relaxing and well-deserved lunch.

The team accomplished an amazing amount of planting in challenging conditions.  Thank you so very very much!

Many thanks to Manuela for organising the very productive volunteer day!

And a big thank you to the team!  We really enjoyed meeting everyone and all the interesting conversations. And we very much appreciate your hard work and amazing contribution to CUE Haven.  The trees you have planted are a much needed addition to the CUE Haven reserve – what a wonderful legacy.

We hope you enjoyed the day as much as we did and do look forward to having you out again for another fun and productive volunteer day. And we also look forward to having you out with your friends and family for a leisurely visit soon to explore more of your community native forest reserve.

Thank You!! Thank You!!