The ‘little cog’ behind city’s gully care

Katherine Hay remembers when Hamilton’s first gully became protected.

The Hamilton conservationist was working at the Waikato Environment Centre at the time when Nawton families approached council lobbying for gully restoration.

‘‘Gullies had long been filled up with rubbish and housing debris and people were just sick of it,’’ the 71-year-old said.

Now gully restoration has ‘‘mushroomed’’ and Hay believes Waiwhakareke Natural Heritage Park was the catalyst for it.

‘‘When Tui 2000 first started there were very few groups around – in fact probably no other ones – but now there are so many gully groups in the Waikato.’’

Hay has been involved in many environmental initiatives around Hamilton and Waikato over more than 20 years.

She was a part of Tui 2000’s Hamilton Halo project aimed at bringing tū ī back into the city, Predator-Free Hamilton, a plant pest eradication programme at Jubilee Park and the Kō kako Recovery Project at Mokaihaha Ecological Area near Tokoroa.

But if you ask Hay about the work she has done, she will say she’s ‘‘just a little cog in a big great wheel’’.

Growing up in Hamilton on a two-acre section near Miropiko Reserve, it’s not surprising Hay fell in love with nature.

She was often found watching curious fantails or in the bush making morepork noises to entice the birds closer.

When she joined the Hamilton Junior Naturalist club – initially as a tagalong – at age 11, her curiosity grew.

‘‘I just loved my time there. We used to camp out at Ō pā rau, near

Kā whia, where we learnt the botanic names of all the native species.

‘‘This was pre-possum and rat control awareness, and you could still hear the odd kō kako song in the distance.’’

Through it, she met conservationist John Kendrick too– the man made famous for the morning birdsong on Radio New Zealand’s Morning Report.

‘‘He was an absolute bird person.

‘‘He would spend days sitting on a hide on a beach photographing a fairy tern, and I was just in awe of him.’’

After a few years of respite exploring other careers, such as teaching, marketing and raising her three children, a stepdaughter and ‘‘a couple of strays’’ – she was called back to conservation work.

Once she studied ecology and environmental planning at University of Waikato, everything just clicked.

She spent 11 years working at the Waikato Environment Centre.

‘‘I felt like I should have been doing this all along.

‘‘It all made sense to me that people should be looking after the soil, having productive gardens, and living sustainably.’’

‘‘At the time people had a basic lack of awareness of environmental issues.

‘‘There were a lot of issues, but people didn’t always know how to improve things.’’

These days, life moves at a slower pace.

Almost every Thursday Hay helps out at the Waikato Ecological Restoration Trust nursery in Tamahere, and does rat monitoring and weeding at various sites around Waikato.

She also spends a lot of time in her backyard keeping tū ī bellies full.

Her four regulars go through two bottles of sugared water a day.

‘‘I feel good that I’ve stuck at it for such a long time, but there’s always more to do.’’