Fight against kauri dieback gets funding boost

ARC Councillor Sandra Coney uses a cleaning station in the Waitakere Ranges at Piha to remove soil from her shoes.

The fight against kauri dieback received a welcome funding boost this week. The Government pledged almost $5 million for a five-year programme to protect New Zealand's native kauri.

Kauri dieback (Phytophthora taxon Agathis, or PTA) is a disease attacking kauri trees in the upper North Island and on Great Barrier Island.
It has been found in the Waitakere Ranges Regional Park and other land in Auckland.

"The Government's decision to fund the fight against kauri dieback is very welcome news for everyone who has worked to save kauri," says Sandra Coney, Chair of the Auckland Regional Council (ARC) Parks and Heritage Committee.

"Kauri is one of our most treasured native species and vital to our ecosystem."

The programme will include:

• research to improve knowledge of how to detect kauri dieback
• research into what spreads the disease and how, and control methods
• further education and public awareness campaigns.

"The ARC has been working hard to contain the spread of kauri dieback in the Waitakere Ranges and to protect our other parks and private land in the Auckland region," says Councillor Coney.

"The injection of another $4.7 million into the programme will make a huge difference.

"We have also valued the extra strength and knowledge that comes from being part of the joint agency response, and look forward to working with the other agencies and iwi on the management of this disease into the future."

The joint response to kauri dieback consists of the ARC, MAF Biosecurity New Zealand, the Department of Conservation, Northland Regional Council, Environment Bay of Plenty and Environment Waikato.

Public help needed to protect kauri

"While the research is under way, we still need the public's help to stop the spread of this deadly disease by keeping to tracks in parks and reserves, cleaning footwear and equipment that has been in kauri forest and staying away from the roots of kauri trees," says Councillor Coney.

"Due to past felling and milling of trees, most kauri now exists only in fragmented pockets and we must protect it from this new threat for future generations."

Believed to be a soil-borne disease caused by a soil pathogen, the disease is specific to kauri and can kill trees and seedlings of all ages. Affected trees show yellowing leaves, canopy thinning, dead branches and lesions that bleed gum across the lower part of the trunk.