Fantail, Weka, Pu-Pu-Pukeko

Artwork by Rose Ellen Bohnsack

We have been blessed with another visit from Dr. Joe Sheldon to teach our Terrestrial Ecosystems course. Starting Monday morning, he invited students to come on a journey with him, not so different from Gandalf, to behold Creation and learn the names of some new "friends" like totara and matai. And that's just what we did! We all piled in the vans and headed for the West Coast. Despite heavy amounts of rain, we ventured out onto the trails to learn about NZ fauna and flora. As part of the course, students are responsible for keeping a field journal with daily reflections. Here is a little of what student Nora Kahler (Houghton) had to say about her experience on the wet West Coast:

"Over the course of our West Coast terrestrial ecology trip, the rain has provided a nearly incessant rhythm punctuating our days. Sometimes light and misty, other times heavy and relentless, its persistence as the backdrop to our journey remained constant. When overcast skies poured forth precipitation we were compelled to don our raingear, effectively turning the group into a multi-colored rainbow snaking its way steadily down the trail. I have come to recognize my bundled up, brightly clad, hooded classmates by the color of their rain jackets: Bri in deep purple and Rachel in bright yellow, Kelsey in light green and Colin in bold blue. The list goes on, but it seems that the variegated raingear we wear visually captures the dynamic vibrancy that forms the essence of our group. Trudging through the rain day after day, we may look drenched and bedraggled, but this sorry state passes away as we shed waterproof layers, leaving them for the drying room to work its restorative magic. This afternoon, our perseverance through the rain paid off in a visually striking reward. Upon completion of our research for the day, we walked to the road and encountered a rainbow arching across the sky just ahead. As the day progressed and we hiked further, we found not one, but two additional rainbows. This extravagant display of beauty, made possible by the rain, was a feast for the eyes and nourishment for the soul."

Everyone was able to leave the course with somewhere around 100 new "friends". After spending the week learning to identify plants and a little bit about what makes them unique, we had a field identification exam. I was impressed with the amount of information the students were able to learn in this small amount of time. Even better if you can put the names into a song, hence the title of this post! It's a special gift to be able to walk through the bush and tell a button fern from a shield fern or a kahikatea from a rimu. God gave Adam the responsibility of naming Creation, and we're still doing it today!

Our group out on the trails. Regan (Dordt) is hard at
work with his field guide identifying plants.

We were able to visit some pretty "sweet as" locations during the course. Some highlights were the pancake rocks and blowholes at Punakaiki, the lush forest of the Porari River Track, a glow worm cave, and Fox Glacier. We were also able to visit the West Coast Wildlife Center, where we could see the rarest kiwi the rowi or Okarito brown kiwi. Once they're old enough to defend themselves from nonnative predators like stoats, these kiwis will be released into the wild!

Here's our group at Fox Glacier! Photo by Colin Veerman

The second week of the course is focused on research. Each of the four groups of students were able to choose a topic to pursue over two days of field work. We had one group up in the mountains studying moss, another comparing epiphyte growth between beech forests, one group looking at how the edge effect affects bird populations, and the last comparing macroinvertebrate life between limestone and freestone streams. 

Clockwise from Top Left: Students Kate Hoffman (Messiah), Katie Kortman (Dordt),
Ruthie Sutherland (Westmont), and Colin Veerman (Bethel) working on their field-based research projects.

Again, despite the rain, everyone conducted fabulous work which was then presented to us upon our return to the Old Convent in Kaikoura. It was two weeks worth of challenging material, and I am proud to see how much everyone was able to take away from it, even to the point of applying what they'd learned in the form of research. Well done everyone!