Grants to Help Environment

TARANAKI’S endangered species are getting a helping hand from the Government.

The Ngatitara Oaonui Sandy Bay Incorporated Society, Taranaki Regional Council and the Taranaki Tree Trust will receive more than $100,000 from National Biodiversity funding, says New Plymouth MP Harry Duynhoven.

The society will get $62,157 to restore privately owned sand dunes north of Opunake. The dunes are the only significant area that provides habitat for dotterel, oyster catcher and several gecko species. Over the next three years volunteers will put in 20,000 plants and the council will set up a predator trapping programme to be maintained by landowners and Opunake High School students.

The council will get $26,700 to help landowners control stoats and rats in QEII-covenant protected semi-coastal swamp forest south- east of New Plymouth.

The Taranaki Tree Trust’s $18,000 will see it work with landowners to protect coastal wetland, near Okato, and help restore a wetland gully near Manutahi.

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