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Turning the tide on wilding pines 

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The Marlborough Sounds Restoration Trust won the Landscape category and Supreme Award in the 2021 Cawthron Marlborough Environment Awards for their work to get rid of wilding pines and bring back the bush.  

 

For the field day 58 guests cruised Tōtaranui/Queen Charlotte Sound on June 11, 2022, to see the success of the  wilding pine control project. Wilding pines destroy the natural landscape, dominate skylines and put native bush at risk. What seemed like an impossible task when the Trust formed in 2003 has now become reality through poisoning the pines, one bay at a time. As the pines die, the native bush returns.

 

Trust Chairman John Hellstrom highlighted the importance of strategic planning for getting funding and the community on board. The Trust is expanding its efforts to pest control to stop deer, goats and possums from destroying the regenerating bush. The Awards judges were impressed at how the Trust has worked with Sounds residents, industry groups, Council and the Department of Conservation to achieve such great results for the environment. 

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Congratulations to the Trust, and our thanks to Morgans Road Nursery, sponsors of the Landscape and Habitat Enhancement Award; and Marlborough Research Centre and Plant & Food Research, joint sponsors of the Supreme Award.