TUATEAWA PLANT SPOT: MANUKA AND KANUKA 2.

In 1773 Captain Cook and his sailors had their first taste of Spruce Beer, NZ style! Made by fermenting a mix of molasses, hops and water, it brewed in under a week. The only variable was the anti scurvy ingredient. In the northern hemisphere spruce was used but in NZ manuka and rimu vegetation was added as the vitamin C. source. It must have been a decent drop because, in 2003, a micro brewery, The Wigram Brewing Company, revived the recipe and have had good success with their product in national competitions.

Both plants are pioneer species and before the arrival of man would have been fairly scarce occupying open ground like slips and eroded river banks. First the Polynesians and later the Europeans, by their agricultural practices, created lots of open habitats for these plants. Controlling regrowth in pastures became a major problem and both species came to be regarded as weeds. Help seemed to be at hand in the mid 1930's. Areas of Manuka in Geraldine were found to be dying at an increasing rate.The dying Manuka were heavily infested with sap sucking insects that had, somehow, arrived from Australia. Lacking any of their native predators, and, with a lot of help from commercial and farming interests the scale insect was established country wide by the mid 1950's. It all looked good for the farming community until a fungal parasite of the scale insect also arrived. Now little trace of that original scale insect can be found and the populations of both Manuka and Kanuka are as vigorous as ever they were.

Another Australian scale insect is now found on our plants, but it is relatively harmless. On a sunny day you can glimpse the translucent threads of the insect's honey dew shining in the canopy. Tuis and bellbirds are often seen feeding on these in the newer growth of both plants. What is not consumed becomes food for the fire damp fungus which covers the branches of so many of the Manuka trees with a grimy black deposit.

In Tuateawa many of us live amongst the Manuka and Kanuka.They have taken over much of the old farm land. Fire risk, rather than fireblight, occupies our thoughts. Both of these species contain quantities of dead and finely divided combustible material in their crowns. The timber has less moisture than most native species and the leaves contain an highly volatile and combustible oil. On a fire risk scale running from 1 to 10 both species have values of 9 to 10. This is equivalent to eucalypts. To add further perspective, pine plantations have a risk factor of 6. Best of all, at 1 is the native fuchsia. At any time in the dry period a bush fire is a possibility. It has almost become accepted practice for car thieves to burn their ride when they are finished and fireworks pose their own problems. It doesn't pay to be complacent but, in our time, there have been no serious fires. This says a lot for the awareness of Tuateawans.

In their own way Manuka/Kanuka are as pivotal in the regeneration of our bush as the kereru. By their presence they improve the environment. Wind and temperatures are moderated, the soil is contributed to and it's moisture content held for longer in the dry times. In their shelter the fore runners of the bush; pepper tree, native privet and whitey wood, to mention a few, can become established. Eventually the sheltering Kanuka/Manuka will be overtopped by the larger trees of the bush. The timescale for complete regeneration is hard to imagine. But, in some well soiled road cuttings, thirty years has seen these pioneer species much reduced in significance. Wind and wetas have contributed to their decline and they are not being replaced by younger plants from ground level. The pioneers have served their time.