A move to native grass
Going, going - whatever is happening to Ōtari’s Cockayne Lawn? In honour of Dr Leonard Cockayne, and his role in establishing the `Ōtari Open-Air Native Plant Museum’ in 1926, staff are replacing the lawn’s current exotic grass with native grass. Next year’s centenary of what is now known as the Ōtari Native Botanic Garden, is a good time to remember the eminent botanist’s ideals in protecting native plants, and his aim to exclude all exotic plants from the garden, even the grass on the lawn. When the exotic lawn was first established, back in the 1950s, it was intended as a temporary sward to be replaced by the native cotula (used on bowling greens). Staff decided the imminent centenary was a good time to rectify this ‘temporary status’. The new grass will be Stewart’s Slender Poa, a new variety bred from Poa imbecillia that’s deemed preferable to cotula. Watching grass grow will be a thing, this spring.
Posted: 25 September 2025
