Our 2025 series was as informative and popular as ever. Many new faces were welcomed, along with Trust regulars. All were treated to fascinating insights from our guest speakers
We learned from Te Papa’s Leon Perrie and Lara Shepherd of the spiky world of the taramea. It’s the speargrass that trampers both love and hate – for its prickly viciousness and stunning beauty. You can see these striking plants (from a safe distance) around the Ōtari rock and alpine gardens.
Te Papa Curators, Julia Kaspar and Phil Sirvid, spoke of the very beneficial world of insects and spiders. Most flies are pollinators and we wouldn’t have many flowers without them, and of 19 sandfly species in New Zealand only three of them will bite – was the insect-friendly message from Julia. Meanwhile Phil assured us that most spiders can’t see worth a damn, and that New Zealand spiders are blessed with a lack of venom. Endemism of both our spiders and flies is very high: 91% of fly and 97% of spider species are found nowhere else in the world.
Te Papa Botany Curator, Heidi Meudt, presented an engaging summary of a 2023 Science Expedition to Auckland Island, travelling with fellow scientists on the Rodney Russ research vessel Strannik. She noted that Leonard Cockayne had explored multiple Subantarctic Islands on a 1907 expedition. The Strannik expedition was hugely successful. Heidi and her colleagues camped in harsh conditions for several nights among the subalpine vegetation and herbfields and amassed between them 1,124 observations.
Ōtari’s own plant conservation researcher, Jennifer Alderton-Moss, gave an update about the native orchid research at the Lions Ōtari Plant Conservation Laboratory. The germination of several rare native orchids, which involves identifying the particular fungi they require, is going well. The current challenge is getting these orchids out of the laboratory and back into the wild. Various methods are being trialled.
Thanks everyone for your support for this year’s highly successful series.