Students out there working hard

Eighteen students from Mapua School have been working really hard to help restore the swamp forest in Tane's Ark. They have been doing everything from planting trees to saving eels from old ditches.  It's all about helping the environment and learning new things that they wouldn't learn anywhere else.
This photo shows some of the hard workers planting and eeling.

Check out our photo boards of our progress as we upload them to this website.

Why Tane's Ark?

The name Tane's Ark tells some of the story of our new project. The name comes from Tane, the Maori god of the forest. The ark part of the name was chosen because it reminds us of the Bible story of how Noah built an ark to save all the animals from the coming flood.
Our logo also tells the story of what we are trying to do in the Tane's Ark area which is to plant more trees and hopefully even save animals like eels and attract more native birds. We are trying to turn our project into a swamp forest so that birds, fish and eels will live there in a nice welcoming habitat for them.

In the past we have helped restore a Wetlands habitat and that took us more than a year to finish so this year we have a challenge to get Tane's Ark looking wonderful again. Before the diggers came in to clear the site for us, Tane's Ark was a dump. Just big lumps of grass, blackberry and willows everywhere but now we have started planting some carex grasses, flax, manuka, kanuka, kowhai and cabbage trees.  So far we have planted around a thousand plants. To be honest I think we have done a wonderful job so far. What about you?