This year we were celebrating Conservation Week, and as a part of the celebration, we asked people to share their conservation activities with us. Thank you for sharing your stories. Each story is interesting, unique and inspirational.
"I discovered a young Kauri tree under a mountain of Jasmine on the fence line between her garden and Leigh Reserve, while starting my own working bee. Hugely motivating discovery!" - Arletta van den Bosch
"We teamed up to work on a beautiful garden at the Learning Support Centre, including butterfly and bee plants, veggies for the garden to table learning of our students, and herbs. Also the Orewa College food tech Hopper Block has been provided with a lovely fresh herb garden by LSC students and teachers, simply by making use of existing raised garden beds, so OC can reduce their plastic and costs. He put a lot of time, and resources to get it running - it’s beautiful! Also for the learning of the students. Later this year students and I are making a huge bottle top mosaic for this herb garden, from caps he has been collecting for 10 years. I also do zero waste art activities like make beeswax wraps with students and teachers, and manage their centre’s composting, soft plastics recycling." - Nonavee Dale and colleagues (teacher aides)
"I am part of a group of volunteers who help weed and plant native plants in Le Roys bush . I planted a large number of trees along the stream banks and removing weeds each Wednesday morning, our group is involved in poisoning and removing bamboo, moth plants, woolly nightshade and ginger. I also supervise 4 bait stations during the Kaipātiki predator blitz durations and this year I independently transplanted 2x Totara and 4x Kahikatea into the bush where willows once stood." - John Newnham
"I am running beach clean-ups, teaching the children to pick up the litter around their school and to put their food scraps in their compost bin, volunteering at the North Shore Resource Centre and running the workshops for people to help people upcycle rather than buy new. I am also working on a display to set up beach clean-ups to help raise awareness of our Maui dolphin situation." - Emma Wingrove
"We have been planting trees and plants about 100, so far, on a barren section in the South Island, so they can attract more birds and bees to the area. There is already two Kereru living there." - Jahmima
"I am distributing over 2000 luffa sponges (through my wee business) across New Zealand and Australia to replace synthetic sponges and scourers that leave microplastic that get their way to our rivers and ocean." - Estefanía Fernández Míguez