Kia ora bloggers last week we had a special visit from Whaea Stella but most of us know her as Aunty Stella. She came to visit us to teach us about Kauri dieback. If you don’t know what Kauri dieback is, it is a disease that spreads around and kills our Kauri. The population of Kauri used to be 100% now there is only 7% of Kauri left. In the middle of Whaea Stella’s presentation she talked to us about the most popular Kauri Tree, Tane Mahuta and his brother, Kairaru. She then talked to us about why it’s important to wash our boots or shoes at the “wash your shoes” station because by simply walking through our Ngahere you could create Kauri dieback. Now Whaea Stella’s crew and her are starting to put wash your shoe stations in most of our Ngahere. To prove her point that mud can spread in a short amount of time she used her own dog named “Oi” as an example by putting his paws in mud and letting him walk on a piece of paper showing how much dirt he could spread in a short amount of time before she did this experiment she put a muzzle around “Oi’s” mouth. Since Whaea Stella and her crew started putting wash your shoe stations in our Ngahere she did this experiment at one of the shoe stations and camouflaged in the bush to see if people will actually wash their shoes and 20 people walked through that bush but only 8 out of 20 washed their shoes. 2 of the most important facts I learnt about Kauri dieback is that Kauri dieback can spread in a short amount of time and kill our Kauri and whenever we walk into our Ngahere we have to wash our shoes.
Did you know that simply walking in our Ngahere it could create Kauri dieback?
Bye hope you learnt something!
