During that time he advised on setting up Wanganui District Council's forests, and feels "a certain sadness" at their impending sale. In 1989 the institute gave him a travel award and he investigated logging in the Pacific northwest of north America.
In 1993 he went to China to advise on forestry for the Loess Plateau in Gansu Province, at the headwaters of the Yellow River. He combined that with scholarship travel to Korea and Japan, to look at crops like ginseng and fungi that can be grown under forests.
In 2005 Mr Moore left Horizons and started his own forestry consultancy business, Moore and Associates. At around the same time he and wife Pam began a mixed forestry and farming venture on 200ha in Longacre Rd near Whanganui.
They planted steeper parts of the land in trees, fenced off wetlands in the gullies and carried on grazing the rest - with no reduction in meat and wool production.
In 2012 that venture won the Middle Districts Farm Forestry Association's McKean Cup for excellence in farm forestry, with a citation calling him "a consultant who actively practises what he preaches".
Still consulting, he now says he has never been busier.
He's often called on as an expert witness to provide evidence about indigenous forestry - most recently in Te Anau. He's advised on a wetland for the Riri a te Hori papakainga near Putiki.
He's done a review of Nelson City Council forests - which are used for waste disposal, subdivision and recreation as well as water systems, soil conservation and commercial production.
He's made two trips to the Chatham Islands, to advise on macrocarpa valuation and use. Some of his most exciting work at present is advising several iwi trusts that are planting mānuka on Māori land.
He said iwi had an affinity with land, vegetation and water and a sense of purpose about improving the environment.
"It's actually happening, and it's good to be involved in helping them."
