Crown Park Gully Restoration
In 2019, Lake Taupō Christian School joined the Kids Greening Taupō programme and began to restore the Crown Park Gully near their school, buying restoration equipment and planting native trees. This gully is steep, weedy and has terrible geothermal pumice soil. It was always going to be a challenge. However, it is used by many surrounding schools and ECE centres and is on the edge of a special geothermal area containing endangered geothermal plants, so it is an important site.
In 2020 and 2021, they headed back to the site to plant and do rubbish pick ups, getting Tauhara Primary on board too. They also had a Wicked Weeder session at the site, clearing weeds from the area. A fire in 2021 completely cleared another area of the gully, so plants started going in there too. Unfortunately, after the fire the broom flourished, colonising the site. The battle between weeds and native plants has raged ever since!
Before and after a Wicked Weeders session in 2021 with Lake Taupō Christian School
In 2022, Lake Taupō Christian School students collected native seedlings from a pine forest and replanted them into the gully space with the students from Tawa Street Preschool. It was fantastic tuakana-teina learning and a great end to the seedling collection project and was the start of Tawa St Preschool also becoming kaitiaki of the space. We were able to successfully transplant a range of native plants from pine forest to local gully, and learn lots about our native plants and restoration along the way. Read more about this fantastic project here.
In 2022 and 2023, large areas above the gully were planted as part of Greening Taupō Day celebrations. Over 7000 native plants went in and a new bike track was added. Read more about that site here.
In 2023, Taupō Intermediate School joined in, helping with weeding, clearing a huge area of broom and adding more plants.
In 2025, in Conservation Week, a fantastic combined effort went into another attempt to establish the native forest in this difficult space. At the start of the year Tawa St Preschool tamariki made a video asking for funding to have their restoration planting in the Crown Park Gully sprayed, as the weeds were a bit out of control. Thanks to the Kids Greening Taupō Contact Energy Take Action Fund a contractor was paid to sort out their space. Then, supported by senior Lake Taupo Christian School students, they were able to put another 100 native plants in there. A class from Tauhara Primary School, Taupo had been learning about erosion, so joined us to help the erosion in the gully by planting the banks. We did an experiment looking at how roots hold soil together and how leaves protect soil from the weather, then our student leaders did a planting demonstration and we got into it. With time to spare, we also added another 100 plants to the garden by the school and bike track, making it beautiful for the community and wildlife. Thanks Taupō District Council for your support and John Hutchison for doing the holes for us. What a community effort!
The restoration journey at Crown Park Gully hasn’t stopped there. Students from Tauhara College's Duke of Edinburgh class joined tamariki from Tawa Street Early Learning Centre to continue transforming the gully into a thriving native habitat in 2026.
Tauhara College students tackled large areas of weeds throughout the site. Their hard work cleared the way for the next stage of restoration; planting even more native plants in the gully Together the two groups planted native seedlings that had been rescued from a NZ Forest Management site, where they would otherwise have been destroyed during forestry operations. For many of the Tauhara College students, the planting brought back memories of their time at St Patrick's Catholic School, where they had taken part in similar restoration work in the Brentwood Gully. It was special to see them continuing their environmental journey and encouraging and supporting the younger tamariki along the way.
One of the highlights of the Crown Park gully project is seeing the connections formed between the different age groups. Together they showed that restoring nature is something everyone can be part of, no matter their age. Thanks to the dedication of both Tauhara College and Tawa Street Early Learning Centre, the restoration of Crown Park Gully continues to gain momentum. Each planting day, mulching session, and weed-clearing effort brings the gully one step closer to becoming a thriving native space for wildlife and the community to enjoy for generations to come.
