It is great to have something to celebrate. I refer to the Shotover Management Unit (MU) wilding control program. This success is due to the extensive, sustained, combined efforts of many over the years.

No one organisation or person can claim the gold medal for this, but rather we need to mint a truck load of bronzes. The milestone I am referring to is the start of the maintenance only phase in this MU due to the removal of all known seeding trees, with no barrier in the way of killing any we have missed.

This is significant and comes after 16 years of consistent effort to gain consent to remove the seed sources. The last known mature coning trees being felled in April last year…