A small contingent of hardy A Rocha members from Greater Wellington comprising Richard Noble, Dennis Fountain, Jean and Richard Rhoades joined the Associates of Southern Star Monastery and local Catholic folk at Kopua for two days of extensive planting of the monastery grounds over Matariki weekend.

Richard Rhoades reports:

We stayed in the guesthouse and on Friday morning joined with over 30 people under Mike Stone’s guidance to plant on the wetland area down toward the river.

After morning tea in the guesthouse, we headed back to the same area until lunchtime.

After lunch, we were transported to Kopua Rd and planted along the fence line [in the future Suzanne Aubert Forest] until about 3:30pm.

On Saturday morning with about 15 people, we returned to Kopua Rd and planted away from the fence line in cleared areas alongside existing blackberry. (This is to be cleared in the next year.)

After morning tea, we headed west from the monastery and down the path towards the Hermitage. We started planting on a sloping area near the Hermitage and also on slopes down toward the river. In the afternoon this planting was finished and more planting was done on the river flats. We finished about 3:30pm.

Richard Noble writes, “The best part of 2,000 plants were put down into wonderfully soft and moist soil, a significant step towards the implementation of the Southern Star Monastery regeneration project led by associate Mike Stone.

Mike Stone reports “Over Matariki we planted 1495 trees/plants from Coppermine Nursery and 500 trees from Horizons—- as well there were a trailer load of trees from the Manawatu local group’s A Rocha nursery (mostly originally potted from Kopua last year) which I did not have time to count but I estimate it was about 200. So, the exact figure planted over Matariki was between 2100-2200.”

Mike spoke of his confidence that the planting phase of the 5-year plan will be completed in 2025, leaving the final year for maintenance of the various regeneration sites.