The New Zealand scurvy grasses (Lepidium species) include the famous Cook’s scurvy grass (L. oleraceum), a species which has gained almost legendary status as the plant that saved Captain Cook and his crew from the depredations of scurvy. Whilst modern research has shown that this is gross exaggeration it cannot be doubted that this plant and its allies were important green foods for not only scurvy ridden sailors but iwi (who in New Zealand knew the plants collectively as ‘nau’).
Mangere
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Mangere Island provides an important predator-free refuge to many rare and endemic invertebrates, birds and plants. Restoration first started on the island in the 1970’s with the Wildlife Service planting akeake shelterbelts in Douglas Basin and on the Top Plateau in an effort to expand the habitat available to black […]
Status (2012):Population (2013):Trend: Nationally critical298 mature individualsStable Restricted to Little Mangere Island for over 80 years, the deteriorating condition of the small area of forest available to the birds and their resulting population decline saw the seven remaining birds transferred to a larger patch of bush on adjacent Mangere Island […]