Waihī Estuary’s original name Te Heriheri restored as part of wetland project

Te Heriheri wetland signage unveiled by Minister Potaka, Chair McDonald, Professor Kura Paul-Burke and Roana Bennett. Photo / Bay of Plenty Regional Council

By Pokere Paewai of RNZ

An estuary near Maketū in the Bay of Plenty has had its original name Te Heriheri restored as part of an iwi-led project to restore the health of the entire wetland ecosystem.

Te Wahapū o Waihī – the collective of Ngāti Whakahemo, Ngāti Whakaue, Ngāti Mākino, Ngāti Pikiao and Tapuika – was established by the iwi and hapū of Waihī Estuary to restore and protect the health and mauri of the wai.

The collective works with a range of organisations, including Bay of Plenty Regional Council, the Ministry for the Environment, local landowners, the Waihī Drainage Society and community members.

Project lead Professor Kura Paul-Burke (Ngāti Whakahemo, Ngāti Mākino, Ngāti Awa) told RNZ one of the factors that contributed to the poor condition of the estuary was the four freshwater contributors, which once were rivers, were now straightened canals carrying polluted sediment loads straight from the land and human activities into the estuary.

Minister Potaka and Professor Kura Paul-Burke lead the community. Photo / Bay of Plenty Regional Council

“We purchased 30ha of dairy farm to convert to wetland and salt marsh. And the reason we did that was we wanted to build a korowai of wetlands around our estuary, because our estuary, Te Wahapū o Waihī, is one of the top five most degraded estuaries in the country. It does not meet safe swimming guidelines. It has permanent public health warning signs for our kaimoana, our shellfish.

“High nitrogen, phosphorus loads enter the estuary with E. coli levels consistently exceeding safe food consumption levels. So it’s in a very, very poor condition.”

Converting 30ha of dairy farm into wetland involved 160,000 native plants and fencing off 16km of waterways for riparian planting, she said.

It also involved working with farmers to establish environmental plans in the upper catchment, she said.

Paul-Burke said all work to do with the environment was ongoing, but this part of the project would end in June of this year, and the hope was to then start building more wetlands around the estuary.

“The power of this project has been the five iwi coming together, working together alongside the Bay of Plenty Regional Council and Ministry for the Environment. But this project is led by iwi.”

Last Friday iwi members and stakeholders gathered at the wetland to commission a new pump station and unveil a new sign that restored the area’s original name, Te Heriheri.

Elected members and representatives of Te Wahapū o Waihī. Photo / Bay of Plenty Regional Council

“We had farmers, the ratepayers association, the drainage society. We had Minister Tama Potaka, representatives from all of the five iwi and local communities because it’s better when we all work together and all of us have worked together,” Paul-Burke said.

She said it was a beautiful ceremony and a chance to acknowledge the original name of the area.

Paul-Burke said Te Heriheri was a seasonal settlement where Ngāti Whakahemo would stay in the spring and summer months to harvest resources for the coming winter.

“So for us Ngāti Whakahemo, we were once known as the net makers, and Te Heriheri or this wetland played a major role in our trading economy with our neighbouring other iwi or tribes.”

It was also an ecologically significant area in terms of the range of native species, including plants, birds, tuna and inanga, she said.

While the 30ha wetland and salt marsh restoration was ongoing, restoration projects within the estuary had started, including with tuangi or cockles, pipi, and seagrass, Paul-Burke said.

“What we used was for a baseline for those kaimoana species, we use mātauranga Māori and/or the intergenerational transmission of environmental knowledge from our ancestors through to today. And so we interviewed kaumātua, and they have all since passed on, unfortunately.

“But we interviewed them and asked them, when you were young, where did you used to go to collect your pipi and your tuangi? And they talked about when they were children, which meant that someone older took them, their nanny, their koro, their parents, etc., which then traversed different generations of knowledge.”

With that mātauranga as a baseline, they mapped and surveyed the entire estuary. Standard marine surveys had only identified 16ha of pipi and tuangi in the estuary, the surveys based on mātauranga identified 30ha plus, she said.

“The power and importance of that intergenerational knowledge has identified that there were actually more kaimoana in our estuary than modern science has been able to access by over 50%.

“So we are hoping to develop a new way of surveying and monitoring pipi in particular alongside tuangi so that anyone, any whānau, hapū, iwi or communities across the motu, across the country, can do surveys themselves using this Mātauranga Māori approach.”