SNAs at Waipuna Station

• Published date: 08 December 2021
• Publication title: West Coast Farming Times, The

But having an SNA or even several on your land need not be an outrageous imposition - if you have scale.

At least that's been the experience of one of the region's biggest landholders, Ken Ferguson, of Waipuna Station.

The Grey Valley spread he farms with his brother Mark has been in the care of Ken's family since the 1860s and has 60ha set aside in significant natural areas. "The SNAs we've done, we entered into voluntarily when the last Labour government was in - we had some biodiversity funding - they gave us about $50,000 towards the fencing costs," Ken says.

The process started more than 15 years ago when the Grey District Council decided to comply with the RMA requirement to identify and protect SNAs in its territory.

It was one of the few councils in New Zealand to do so and the only one on the Coast to complete the process: Buller began the work but let it lapse. At a recent meeting of the Tai o Poutini Plan Committee, there was consternation when the Grey District reps announced they would be taking no further part in the committee's eff orts to avoid identifying SNAs across the Coast, because their council did the job years ago.

Waipuna Station, spanning 20km from State highway 7 to the mountains, was an obvious candidate at the time, for some protection, with native forest bordering the Grey River that winds through the property - and abundant bird life.

"The council sent an ecologist round to identify the significant parts - in particular the lowland kahikatea and I agreed that we had a 7ha block that was suitable to fence off.

"They off ered to help me with the fencing costs, which we shared 50/50," Ken recalls.

Ken and his wife Robyn have since added a number of smaller blocks around the farm that are, in his words, "quite picturesque."

"We've built that up over the years to 60-odd hectares and I added a marginal strip on the Clark (river), that flows into the Grey."

As farms go, Waipuna Station would have to be one of the most beautiful in New Zealand. It's also extremely productive.

The 2500ha station supports 20,000 stock units made up of 3500 ewes, 1700 hinds, 700 stags (for velvet production) and 800 breeding cows.

"In the early days, much of this land would have been clothed in bush. There are some really good photos of the Ahaura bridge, what it used to look like and what it looks like now, and it's been totally denuded of native forest, for better or for worse."

It was probably his cousins who owned a sawmill at Ahaura who took most...