General Subjects > Travel / Places to Visit
NZ Field trips January 2007
Paddy Tobin:
Got it fixed now, Joakim.
Paddy
Joakim B:
Then I fix mine Paddy :)
Joakim B:
Lesley
Is the NZ native orchids grown in gardens? I am extra curious about everything that is orchids.
Kind regards
Joakim
Lesley Cox:
That's certainly true Paddy, rise again both loudly and painfully! but it's the bulbinella which is known locally as Maori onion, mainly because of the strappy foliage I suppose. The local name for hymenanthera is Matagouri.
We saw just one celmisia, the little and least exciting of all, Celmisia gracilenta.
And these few are specially for you Paddy, knowing you like Aciphylla aurea.
This female stem carried thousands of almost ripe seeds. I collected a few and had bleeding hands to show for it. The next pic shows a stem literally weighed down with seed.
This is a different species, not sure which but Dave or David will know. We saw just this one plant, with an oldish, male flower stem.
Wet, all of us and smelly, just the dog, we left the area in search of lunch. Then later in the day to Macrae's Flat.
Lesley Cox:
Hi Joakim, the orchid CAN be grown in gardens but because it is so quiet, I doubt if it is, much. The other I mentioned, the microtis, certainly does grow here with me and with David as well as many other gardeners but it is a weed really, totally devoid of horticultural attraction, and seeding into other plants such as precious cushions, and being a pesky nuisance. The flower is green same as the foliage and is less than 5mm across.
Mcraes, as the area is known by locals, is chiefly of interest now for it's massive open cast gold mining operation. There are literally thousands of hectares now involved and much of the landscape looks like the moon. The first picture is a board which tells something of the project and the company concerned, which I think is largely American.
There are viewing areas which show some of the immediate work areas and there are tours arranged through the processing halls and elsewhere. The big trucks which are loaded by a digger whose bucket lifts 38 tonnes at a time, are themselves pretty big. Their load per journey to the processing plant is 191 tonnes each. There was a notice saying that if a gardener worked 24 hours a day with a wheelbarrow, it would take 10 days to move a single truckload.
All very interesting but NOT NICE!
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