The Open-Ground and Container-Raised Indigenous Plants Comparison is a Sustainable Farming Fund project.

Part of the Mahurangi Initiative: A hope-based
network restoring and enjoying the Mahurangi.

November 2009

The War Go On: Potted (foreground) and open-ground (middle) harakeke established 17 months at Sandspit Road are safe from smothering. The root trainer -raised plants that have survived, one of which Cimino genuflects, have suffered badly in their competition with weeds and are barely taller than when they left the nursery. Photography Majorlook Productions

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The Open-Ground and Container-Raised Indigenous Plants Comparison is a Sustainable Farming Fund project.

The project was initiated by Friends of the Mahurangi as part of the Mahurangi Action Plan, which in turn was initiated by Auckland Regional Council—in 2004, to address the Mahurangi Harbour’s elevated sediment accumulation rate.

While it is nominally a three-year project, it is anticipated that the six trial sites will be measured annually for several further years, then less often until the plantings reach maturity.

•  1 Heading for Open-Ground
•  2 Left to Market Forces
•  3 Deforestation Catches Up With the Catchment
•  4 The Search for Silver Bullets
•  5 Trial Transfers to Taupö
•  6 Two and Three Times the Diameter
•  7 A Tree Scientist’s Dream
•  8 Toetoe Gets to Play
•  9 War of the Weeds
• 10 Transplantation Shock
• 11 Less-Shocking Systems
• 12 Survival at Sandspit Road
• 13 Silver-Tongued Strategy
• 14 Indigenous Forestry Strategy
• 15 Sustainable Splash in Lake Taupö
• 16 Growing Trees from the Tractor Seat
• 17 So Much for Science
• 18 Conclusion: The Bottom Line
• 19 Appendix: The Data

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