Our management agreement with New Forests for its Kakapo Estate started in April 2021 and was followed by the smaller Southland Estate in July.
About the estates
Southland
The two managed estates consist of 16 blocks scattered widely across Southland and up into Otago. The compact Southland Estate consists of five blocks totalling roughly 500ha, a few minutes’ drive to the southeast of the small town of Wyndham. Almost the entire estate is radiata planted over two years. It is managed to just one regime, with all the blocks adjacent to each other and covering a tight altitude range from about 150m to 250m.
Kakapo
The larger 2500ha Kakapo Estate is almost the complete opposite of the Southland Estate. The nine southern Kakapo blocks are scattered across the width and half the length of Southland, ranging from Invercargill to Lake Monowai and to Mossburn. The age ranges from zero to 35, with three main species, a range of regimes and covers altitudes from almost sea level to 700m.
Challenges in first few months
Southland sunshine is the name sometimes used to describe rain down our way. It is rain that comes in short, heavy bursts, driven by the bracing southern winds. In the first few months of Wenita managing these estates, we saw a good dose of our special kind of sunshine. This made forest management a little more challenging than usual as we engaged with our new forest estates. The “sunny” weather bedevilled our spraying operations, delayed our planting, softened our roads and drenched our harvesting crews. But on the plus side the fire risk was pretty low.
Forest activities
Southland
Production thinning in the Southland Estate blocks was carried out by the same crew who planted the blocks two decades ago. The crew have been production thinning the Southland Estate for a few years and operate small gear, well suited to the operation which is now nearing completion. We aim for residual stocking at 400spha and the forest is now about a decade off harvest.
Kakapo
The Kakapo Estate has seen a more varied range of activities. We inherited a high-altitude douglas fir cutover to be planted this winter. Winds delayed our preplant spraying for a month, while snow (and Covid lockdown) interrupted our late winter planting of the area with the hybrid pinus radiata attenuata cross. But we got it done in the end. Planting stock was roughly half seedlings and half cuttings..
In another block not too far away, we have clearfell harvest going on. The Barnhill block is mainly comprised of untended stands of pinus radiata aged in their mid-20s. The small trees are well suited to the Roxburgh 3 crew from Otago and clearfell will largely be completed over a 12-month window.
— By Contract Forest Manager Don Frengley