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Te Moana

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Commenced:	01/01/2013
Submitted:	15/01/2013
Last updated:	15/08/2016
Location:	Geraldine, NZ
Phone:	022 126 3890
Climate zone:	Cool Temperate

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Te Moana

Geraldine, NZ

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Two Years On

Project: Te Moana

Posted by Craig Hutchinson about 9 years ago

Two years on from purchase things are moving forward. I built a hut in the first year, fortunately just before a big snow fall (figure 1) that trapped me in for two weeks. The drums at the front hide the chimney to a rocket mass heater. The heater works wonderfully, keeping me snug on those cold nights and means I've always got a pot of hot water available when it's burning.

I dug a small vehicle access track into the pine forest with a 1.5 tonne excavator (figure 2). This has enabled me to use my Hilux truck to readily access the forest with tools for tree removal and trees for planting.

To date I've removed about 1 hectare of pine, taking some out for sale as firewood (not ideal but helps with the finances). Most of the pine trees have been felled on contour and terraces built on them, though this is a work in progress.

As a start to create a food forest I've planted the following edibles:

Around 20 apple trees (all grown from seed for later grafting), 10 qunice, 30 hazelnut, 5 chestnut, 2 walnut, 5 almond, 2 pear, 2 nectarine, two apricot, two peach, two plum, about 50 redcurrent, 20 raspberry, 4 gooseberry, rhubarb, various herbs such as bergamot, oregano and marjoram, thyme, sage, parsley, apple mint, lemon balm etc..

And the following support:

Several Black Locust, many tagasaste, many black wattle, plus lots of comfrey, pea and lupin.

Most of the trees and berries have been grown from seed or cuttings, so they're pretty small at the moment.

Because of the slope most tree planting has been done using a net and pan scheme or planting directly onto a terrace.

Anyway, a start has been made. This year I hope to get some access higher up the property, and construct a small pond to provide water to the areas planted. Ideally this would have been done first, but because I neaded to clear some plantation forest to access a higher point, I wanted to plant the cleared area first to avoid erosion in the future.

Unfortunately this summer (2014/15) we've had a drought and a few of the hazelnuts died, though I've been a lot better off than my neighbours. The pine has been cleared on the lower portion of the slope, with the result the the transpiration from the remaining forest higher up provides some early moring moisture where I've cleared. This along with the terraces and net/pan system has helped I'm sure.

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