Looking back over 2024 for MCC
What a year it’s been for the Motueka Catchment Collective and our catchment community! This article gives a brief summary of some of the happenings and achievements for 2024 for the MCC.
The MCC Steering Group
Action on the ground like planting trees and fencing waterways is what people naturally think a community catchment group is doing. And MCC does do these things, and supports the community to do them too. However, given our large and diverse catchment, a big priority for MCC is to build community capacity and engagement and make good decisions about where to focus efforts.
This makes what our Steering Group does so important. This group sets a framework, support network, and guidance for how all this action happens, to make sure it’s well coordinated and targeted at the most effective things. They aim to create community connection, cohesion and a groundswell of care and drive to look after our precious awa and catchment, and each other. A few achievements and happenings this year for our Steering Group are:
- The Steering Group have met six times this year to discuss and agree key actions and priorities.
- The Steering Group have had changes in personnel, with the Group shrinking from 18 to 11. The formalising for the Co-Chair was an exciting development for the Steering Group.
- There has been leadership training for members, and for those able to attend, Catchment group validation, from Aotearoa Catchment Extension training. This is a New Zealand wide initiative, and it enabled interaction between other Top of the South Catchment Groups.
- A key important action to have achieved was to formalise MCC’s vision, values and objectives. This has been a year of growth for the members, stepping up to change wording within the guiding document, Terms of Reference, so it reflects the MCC’s growth from where we first were, to where we are now, and where we are heading into the future.
- The catchment coordinator and communication team have been a key part of the positive growth and visibility of the MCC, and has increased peoples’ interest in what has happened and what is going to happen
A word from Debbie Win, Co-Chair of the Steering Group:
MCC is a large diverse area, we have wonderful work being done by the Thematic groups, we have the growth of small sub-catchment groups, we have many locals showing real interest in what is happening in the catchment. Success for the Steering Group will be to see these thrive in the future. To keep that growth happening it is essential to start conversations with locals and keep those conversations going. The coming year is going to be another busy time for those who are involved in the MCC.
Actions by our catchment community
Now down to the action on the ground! We’ve been wowed by the amazing mahi and effort put into the Motueka catchment this year by community members. Some of examples include:
Community members trained to use the SHMAK kits (Stream Health Monitoring and Assessment kits) – Thirty six community members have been to one of five of the one day training workshops at different locations around the Motueka catchment with the awesome help of Tasman Bay Guardians to learn how to use SHMAK kits and monitor their local waterways. Stories here:
- Freshwater health monitoring training for Motueka catchment residents
- Residents looking after our upper sub-catchments
Monitoring rivers and streams across the catchment has gradually increased over the year as more community members have been trained. There has been an increase in community engagement and interest in local waterways, lots of learning about stream health, and the start of catchment groups. The following rivers and streams are being monitored by trained community members:
- Baton residents measuring their awa
- Stanley Brook
- Orinoco awa monitoring
- Win Valley locals monitoring the stream they live by
- Dove River
- Greenhill Stream
- Waiwhero Stream (currently monitored by TBG staff)
- Brooklyn River
Restoration work by many residents and landowners in the catchment including planting, fencing, wetland restoration, weeding, propogation, seed collecting. MCC has only captured a small number of stories highlighting the incredible restoration and regeneration work happening on farms, lifestyle properties, and other areas across the catchment. These include:
Hats off to these people, and there are so many more people who we haven’t named here doing great restoration work in the catchment.
Wetland restoration and fencing by a number of residents including:
- Baton House property – Second wetland construction project underway! – Motueka Catchment Collective
- The Quinns – Wonderful wetlands – Motueka Catchment Collective
- Judith Rowe
- Ollie Langridge
Weeding groups
There are a number of very active weeding groups in the catchment tackling some of our toughest weeds such as Old Man’s Beard:
- The Motueka Valley OMB group lead by Bruce Stare
- Community action near Haycocks Bush
Propagation groups and community nurseries
There are a number of keen nurseries and propogation groups helping to grow and provide natives across the catchment. Because of these groups, a number of landowners have established their own nurseries.
- The Tapawera propagation group and nursery (run by Kate Radloff, Chair of MCC’s Biodiversity and Restoration Thematic Group
- The Dovedale Community nursery
- Annette Litherland’s nursery
- The Department of Conservation nursery
Events
Events are an important part of building capacity within the community, and offer a chance for community members to connect and learn. They create excitement and motivation for residents and others to get involved in work for the health of the catchment. MCC has run the following events this year, some in collaboration with other organisations such as Tasman Bay Guardians and NZ Landcare Trust, and covering a wide range of topics. This amounts to an event every 3-4 weeks.
| Event | Date |
| Waterslide event | January 28 |
| Snorkel Drift Dive | February 11 |
| SHMAK kit training | February 16
February 17 June 21 June 29 August 7 |
| Native Resilience event (rescheduled) | February 18 |
| Seed Collection Workshop | April 6 |
| Farm Environment Plans for lifestylers | April 24 |
| MCC Planting workshop | April 27 |
| Fencing workshop | April 28 |
| Native plantings and their co-benefits | May 11 |
| Let’s get those pests! | June 22 |
| MCC Living River Group event | July 28 |
| The BIG Motueka Valley community weeding event | August 11 |
| Catchment Quiz night | October 12 |
| Workshop for small forest owners | November 6 |
| The 2nd BIG Motueka Valley community weeding event | November 10 |
| MCC talks about trapping at Tapawera market | November 26 |
You can find details of these events, along with a rundown of how most of them went:
MCC would like to thank all the volunteers who attended our events, as well as the volunteer helpers who supported them.
MCC’s Thematic Groups
The MCC has six thematic groups made up of community members. These groups have done a heap of work this year. Some key happenings for these groups include:
- The Bidoversity and Restoration group – trees that count application, receiving and assessing project applications from catchment residents, supporting multiple landowner restoration projects, running a number of events, managing community nurseries, guidance and support to landowners and groups, connecting with schools, providing plants and potting mix, and training locals in propogation.
- Forestry Working Group – discussing and inviting experts to talk about risk analysis and sediment flow in the catchment and beginning to organise an event around sediment.
- River Access and Recreation Group – picnic tables being installed through the catchment near the river, contributing to the sign at Lublows Leap including reference to MCC, and starting to build a map with key information about recreation sites or trapping efforts.
- Living River Group – discussions about the gravel extraction and floods, organised an event about indigenous perspectives towards freshwater, and they are preparing a future event to talk about river morphology. They are also try to recruit new members.
- Pest Management Group – running a number of weeding and trapping events, sourcing funding from Predator Free NZ and starting backyard trapping projects in the catchment, receiving and prioritising applications from locals looking for support for their environmental projects.
- Freshwater Monitoring Group – supporting community SHMAK kit training through TBG, supporting community freshwater monitoring of an increasing numbers of rivers/streams in the catchment, and building engagement around the awa, organising an event around sediment with the Forestry Working Group and a get together of SHMAK testers.
Here are some of the summary articles about the work of these groups:
What have MCC groups been up to? – Motueka Catchment Collective
September MCC meetings – Motueka Catchment Collective
Newsletters and communication
MCC has published twelve newsletters, one per month, and many stories. Of those, a number of articles have been published more widely in public media.
Our database has grown to 631 people.
MCC also published its website this year which has been a great achievement – https://motuekacatchment.org.nz/
We look forward to a busy and rewarding 2025!!!