Kauri health survey Waitākere Ranges
A new kauri monitoring programme has been launched in the Waitakere Ranges.
Auckland Council workers are surveying healthy trees as part of their study into kauri dieback disease.
They are investigating the impacts of the disease on individual trees and the wider kauri population.
Auckland Council kauri dieback team manager Lisa Tolich said new remote sensing technology had given the council a good estimate of how many kauri trees spanned the ranges.
The team had drawn a sample of trees to survey.
“We are giving 3500 kauri in the Waitākere Ranges a full health check and will continue monitoring these specific trees for years to come,” Tolich said.
“The trees have been randomly selected from the overall population so field teams don’t know going in whether they’ll be assessing healthy or diseased trees.
“This is important because it means we can build a picture of what’s happening across the entire population – not just the areas where we know the pathogen is already present.”
Data collected will identify risks to tree health associated with the locations, environment and other factors such as changing climate.
Survey findings will help the council assess how well precautionary measures are working and if any adjustments are needed.
Funding for the monitoring programme comes from the Natural Environment Targeted Rate at an expected cost of between $650,000 and $700,000.
This includes the design and delivery of the Waitākere Ranges Surveillance programme between 2020-2022.
Environment and Climate Change Committee chair Richard Hills said the investment was another step towards helping protect and preserve kauri forests.
“Kauri dieback disease is unfortunately not going away and the more we can find out about the disease, through robust processes like our surveillance and monitoring programmes, the better placed we are to protect our native taonga now and for generations to come.”
⚠️ DOGS DIE IN HOT CARS. If you love them, don't leave them. ⚠️
It's a message we share time and time again, and this year, we're calling on you to help us spread that message further.
Did you know that calls to SPCA about dogs left inside hot cars made up a whopping 11% of all welfare calls last summer? This is a completely preventable issue, and one which is causing hundreds of dogs (often loved pets) to suffer.
Here are some quick facts to share with the dog owners in your life:
👉 The temperature inside a car can heat to over 50°C in less than 15 minutes.
👉 Parking in the shade and cracking windows does little to help on a warm day. Dogs rely on panting to keep cool, which they can't do in a hot car.
👉 This puts dogs at a high risk of heatstroke - a serious condition for dogs, with a mortality rate between 39%-50%.
👉 It is an offence under the Animal Welfare Act to leave a dog in a hot vehicle if they are showing signs of heat stress. You can be fined, and prosecuted.
SPCA has created downloadable resources to help you spread the message even further. Posters, a flyer, and a social media tile can be downloaded from our website here: www.spca.nz...
We encourage you to use these - and ask your local businesses to display the posters if they can. Flyers can be kept in your car and handed out as needed.
This is a community problem, and one we cannot solve alone. Help us to prevent more tragedies this summer by sharing this post.
On behalf of the animals - thank you ❤️
2025: The Year of Puzzling It Out!
There’s a one-story house where everything is yellow.
The walls are yellow, the doors are yellow, and even the furniture is yellow.
What colour are the stairs?
Do you think you know the answer to our daily riddle? Don't spoil it for your neighbours! Simply 'Like' this post and we'll post the answer in the comments below at 2pm.
Want to stop seeing riddles in your newsfeed?
Head here and hover on the Following button on the top right of the page (and it will show Unfollow) and then click it. If it is giving you the option to Follow, then you've successfully unfollowed the Riddles page.
We're talking new year resolutions...
Tidying the house before going to bed each night, meditating upon waking or taking the stairs at work.
What’s something quick, or easy, that you started doing that made a major positive change in your life?