Riparian Strips

In the launch issue of the new magazine, Green Ideas; there was an article titled From Muck to Money telling the story of a farmer and his family who boosted milk production in his dairy herd and slashed fertliser costs for his paddocks by rescuing two lakes on his property. 

He did this by engaging with DOC and the local regional council who helped share the costs of removing willows which were choking the lakes. Willows are not good at absorbing nutrients from the farm runoff and they blocked growth of natives that act as better absorbers of excess nutrients.  Once the willows were removed, a planting effort took place to build up a 10m wide strip on either side of waterway system all throughout the property. Fonterra also played a role sponsoring volunteers to help with planting. The farmer also engaged help to reduce the amount of nutrients he was putting on the pastures and developed a plan with consultant Alison Dewes from Headlands Consulting to maximise outputs while minimising the eco-footprint. This new native riparian strip created a significant effect on wetland regeneration and greatly promoted effective waterway restoration.

This is a really awesome story and one that could be used as an example and repeated nationwide.  As the farmer quite rightly said: "If we have to put up signs saying 'You can't swim in this water' then something has gone wrong somewhere".  This does of course not address the question of just how much dairying we can sustain if we treat the environment better because developing a mono-culture of farming must be detrimental  in the long term; however, if we can manage what we currently have with less run-off and less inputs, that has to be good for everyone.

Read more about riparian strips on:
1. Lifestyle block website
2. NIWA website

The Department of Conservation (DOC) website has this useful practical guide for environmental restoration projects

Replanting a riparian strip