ICNC publications

Publications of the Isaac Centre for Nature Conservation are obtainable by forwarding an order with payment to:

Tara Schoenwetter
Isaac Centre for Nature Conservation
P.O. Box 84,
Lincoln University
Lincoln 7647
Canterbury.

Payment by cheque to: Lincoln University.

Glenn H. Stewart & Maria E. Ignatieva (eds) 2000: Urban Biodiversity and ecology as a basis for holistic planning and design. Proceedings of a workshop held on October 28-29, 2000. Lincoln University, Wickliffe Press, Christchurch. ICNC Publication No.1. 111pp. ISBN 0-86476-136-8.

Cost: NZ$25.00. * Sorry not available 

The above proceedings are from a workshop on urban biodiversity and ecology that took place in October 2000 at Lincoln University, New Zealand. The main objective of this workshop was to provide a holistic understanding of the urban environment and implications for integrated and sustainable management. It was based on local examples developed by Christchurch City in its progressive management of the environment.

With 85% of New Zealand people living in urban environments, much more research, education and restoration needs to be centred on cities as part of a growing appreciation of the need for an ecological approach to urban planning and management. Christchurch has seen the loss of many distinctive landscapes and unique habitats over the last few centuries.

The workshop was designed for local authority staff, developers, landscape architects, planners, water and drainage engineers, students, conservationists, teachers and councillors, and others interested in urban ecology.

Contents

Neil Cherry: Climatology of urban environments: Heat islands, climate change, air pollution: physical, chemical and biological indicators.

Larry Burrows: Air pollution indicators

Les Basher: Soils and geomorphology of the urban environment: Why they are different, and how do they provide a foundation for planning and development

David Given and Colin Meurk: Biodiversity of the urban environment: The importance of indigenous species and the role urban environments can play in their preservation

Colin Meurk and Graeme Hall: Biogeography of urban landscapes: Ecological principles and causes of vegetation patterns, their importance to wildlife, opportunities and barriers to dispersal, establishment and succession, and how to accelerate positive trends

Maria Ignatieva, Colin Meurk, and Claire Newell: Urban Biotopes: The typical and unique habitats of city environments and their natural analogues

Ken Hughey: Wildlife of urban environments: Some thoughts on the surprisingly un-surprising New Zealand context

Jonet Ward: Urban aquatic environments

Hirini Matanga: Urban ecology, tangata whenua and the colonial city

Margaret Kilvington, Rhys Taylor and Will Allen: Restoration and the city: Looking for a framework for social and ecological restoration

Roy Montgomery: Ecology and new urbanism: Today the world, tomorrow Lincoln?

Andrew Dakers: Ecological Engineering and Urban Design: Engineering our ecological fit

Maria Ignatieva: Ecopolis - Towards the total holistic city: lessons in integration from throughout the world

Ian Spellerberg (compiler): Group Session Notes

David Given (compiler): A research agenda for the urban environment of Christchurch.

Ross Cullen, Ken Hughey, Kay Booth, Kirsten Crawford, Will Allen & Margaret Kilvington (eds) 2001: Conservation and sustainable use of New Zealand flora. The Flock Hill Workshops. Report No.1. Lincoln University, Wickliffe Press, Christchurch. 64pp.

Cost: NZ$20.00

The "Flock Hill Workshop" is intended to be an annual event and the aim is to promote discussion and analysis of challenging and contemporary nature conservation issues. Attendance at each annual workshop is by invitation only. The workshops provide an opportunity for key thinkers and experts from a wide range of backgrounds to come together and to address issues that cut across a range of disciplines, as a contribution to development of policy in New Zealand.

Noting that about seventy percent of New Zealand’s land area is outside of the national parks and reserves system, two questions provided focus for the forum:

• Where can commercial activities be accommodated with conservation objectives for floras, on non-conservation estate lands?
• What strategies and policies should be employed to achieve those objectives?

The final small group workshop session produced a list of research projects intended to continue investigation and debate, and ultimately leading to action in the sustainable use of indigenous flora on private land. These range from identifying values of indigenous flora and of disincentives for establishment and retention of flora, to scoping of opportunities for indigenous flora projects for whole catchments and multiple farming agro-shrubbery projects. A final background section summarises a framework for thinking through the issues, the role of economic instruments, education and facilitation, cooperative approaches, regulatory approaches, social and legislative change, and both opportunities and barriers. As the report summarises, "the tenor of the workshop was guardedly optimistic" at this point in what is a complex and ongoing debate that does not have easy answers.

Contents

Introduction and background
Problem/Issue definition
What do we want to see in 2025?
How do we get there?
Research topics
Where to from here: Authors’ comments
Bibliography and Appendices.

Kay Booth, Ross Cullen, Ken Hughey, Jason Leppens, Pat Maher & David Simmons (eds) 2002:  Eco-Tourism: An ally of nature conservation?  The Flock Hill Workshops.  Report No. 2.  Lincoln University, Wickliffe Press, Christchurch.  78 pp.

Cost NZ$20.00

The "Flock Hill Workshop" is intended to be an annual event and the aim is to promote discussion and analysis of challenging and contemporary nature conservation issues. Attendance at each annual workshop is by invitation only. The workshops provide an opportunity for key thinkers and experts from a wide range of backgrounds to come together and to address issues that cut across a range of disciplines, as a contribution to development of policy in New Zealand.

Nature and natural sites are key attractions for tourists in New Zealand. Eco-tourism is sometimes promoted as the fastest growing segment of the tourism industry. Eco-tourism is sometimes hailed as a pathway to avoid some of the negative consequences associated with mass tourism. However the term suffers from ambiguity and it lacks ownership. There is doubt over the veracity of claims that eco-tourism, in all its forms, is sustainable. 

The Flock Hill 2002 workshop comprised representatives of the tourism industry, government policy agencies, conservation NGO's and researchers who debated the nature and role of eco-tourism in New Zealand. The workshop focused on three key issues:

• How might we distinguish eco-tourism from other forms of tourism?
• What strategies and policies are required to ensure that eco-tourism contributes to nature conservation? 
• How is this supportive role of eco-tourism to be verified?
  

Contents

Introduction and Aims - including background paper "Eco-tourism: An ally of nature conservation? Defining the rules and measuring that outcomes" by David Simmons.
Defining the Issues
Plenary Discussion
Breakout Groups discussion - Eco-tourism, general tourism and sustainability
Cultural Tourism
A Vision and Objectives for New Zealand Tourism
Breakout Group discussion - Environment, Environmental systems and Positioning in the market
Plenary Discussion - including perspective on Eco-tourism and overview of discussion
Appendices.

Meurk, C.D.  2003.  Establishing shelter in Canterbury with Nature Conservation in mind: A practical guide for the true Cantabrian.  Information brochure produced by Isaac Centre for Nature Conservation and Environment Canterbury. pp 22.

Free publication:

Download cover   (PDF 72 KB)

Download booklet  (PDF 912 KB)

Hedgerows and shelterbelts are living windbreaks that can protect and preserve the environment and our cultural history. Techniques for establishing rapid and efficient shelter across the windswept Canterbury Plains are well researched and practised. Exotic plants undoubtedly grow fast, but many become weeds and mostly offer only limited value to native wildlife. Mixtures of both native and exotic species may give optimal benefits of shelter, permeability, low maintenance, biodiversity and resistance to drought, frost and snow break.

Remnants of indigenous vegetation that once characterised lowland Canterbury provide glimpses of past history and are important food sources for native birds, lizards and insects. The hedges and shelterbelts that bound our farmlands thus lend themselves to resotration of habitat, biodiversity and linkages whilst providing for other farming needs.

Contents

How Shelter brings Biodiversity into your Landscape
How to Create Biodiverse Shelter
A Calendar for creating biodiverse shelter
Essential tips
Design ideas
Other Information Sources
Nurseries that Specialise in Native Plants
Appendix: Indigenous Species for Hedgerows and Shelterbelts in Canterbury.

Ian F. Spellerberg & David Given (eds).  2004. Going Native: Making use of New Zealand's native plants. Canterbury University Press, Christchurch. pp 240. ISBN 1-877257-13-3.
 
Download order form (PDF 2 MB)
 
Have you ever wondered how best to incorporate New Zealand native plants into your garden? Or how to re-create a patch of native bush? This book is a rich compendium of ideas, describing the many and varied practical uses of New Zealand native plants.

With contributions from gardening experts to moving accounts from school children, this is a book by New Zealanders for New Zealand. If you are wondering which New Zealand native plants are frost tender, which prefer coastal sites or which are tall-growing species, there is an extensive A-Z glossary to guide you.

Advice on Landscaping with natives and on cultivating from seed or cuttings is presented in richly illustrated chapters. If you want to play your part in conservation and grow rare and endangered species, or restore an area of native plant habitats, you will find the guidelines in this book. For far too long introduced plants have overshadowed our native plants. This book will help ensure there is a better future for our rich and diverse flora.

Endorsement by Professor David Bellamy.
 
Foreword by Dr. J. Morgan Williams, Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment.

This book retails for $39.95 and can be ordered from Canterbury University Press, Private Bag 4800, Christchurch.  Phone: (03) 364 2914 Fax: (03) 364 2044. mail@cup.canterbury.ac.nz

Kerry-Jayne Wilson.  2004.  Flight of the Huia.  Ecology and conservation of New Zealand's frogs, reptiles, birds and mammals.  Canterbury University Press, Christchurch. pp 412.

New Zealand has suffered one of the most severe but perhaps best documented extinction cascades during the two thousand years since first human contact. This book tells the story of New Zealand's birds, mammals, reptiles and frogs, from their Gondwanian origins to the arrival of the first rats, then people and their camp followers. The loss of now-extinct birds and the introduction of other species have changed ecological systems in this country forever.

In the last fifty years New Zealand has become a world leader in the conservation of endangered species.  Flight of the Huia reviews the way our attitudes to and management of conservation have changed during this time and concludes with a debate on future directions for conservation of this now much altered fauna.  The book is the first to present a history of faunal change in New Zealand and a review of the ecology and conservation of those animals.

Kerry-Jayne Wilson is a senior lecturer in ecology and conservation working within the Ecology and Entomology Group at Lincoln University; and is on the ICNC management board. She has had a life-long fascination for natural history and for thirty years has been active in conservation. This is her first book.

This book retails for $49.95 and can be ordered from Canterbury University Press, Private Bag 4800, Christchurch. Phone: 64 3 364 2914 Fax: 64 3 364 2044. mail@cup.canterbury.ac.nz

Native Plant Communities of the Canterbury Plains, Katie Williams
Published by the Department of Conservation.

This booklet is designed to help people on the Canterbury Plains protect and restore the native plant communities once thriving in the area. It aims to improve awareness of the different native plant communities once dominating the plains and of the important remnants. Included are inspirational examples of restoration work.

This booklet can be downloaded from the Department of Conservation website, or a wire-bound print edition can be ordered from the Motukarara Conservation Nursery or the Canterbury Conservancy Visitor Centre for $5.00.

Motukarara Conservation Nursery
RD2
Christchurch
Phone: 64 3 329 7846
Fax: 64 3 329 7041
motukarara@doc.govt.nz

Canterbury Conservancy Visitor Centre
133 Victoria Street
Christchurch
Phone: 64 3 371 3706
Fax: 64 3 365 1388
northcantyvc@doc.govt.nz