Spring is knocking on the door! The Tui’s are calling.

Planting work at the Wetlands continues apace with Paul van Klink organising for the arrival of more native plants. And of course as the ground warms up, there will be a fair bit of weed action too! We’ve taken delivery of some good mulch, but it’s still a bit green/hot and we’ll have to wait until Autumn next year before we use it.

With the longer days Paul is likely to return to two sessions each Thursday - 10AM - Noon and 2 - 4PM. Keep your eyes on our noticeboard, facebook/instagram page or sign up for our Thursday group emails for updates.

If you’ve got a spare couple of hours on a Thursday and you’d like to help out, get in touch with either Paul (021 056 9146) or Andy (021 107 5520).

The marking of stormwater drains with a “Fish” in and around Wanaka was originally an initiative of Chris Arbuckle from Touchstone to heighten public awareness of where our “waste water” ends up! Since then Wai Wanaka has been working with various community groups around the Upper Clutha for their Adopt a Drain project. Our friends from Wai Wanaka have produced a neat brochure explaining the importance of stormwater drains being for rainwater only and will be attending with FOBC during our marking of stormwater drains.

As part of our Bullock Creek Neighbours project, our personal meet and greet will commence this week (30 Aug) in Stone St, immediately adjacent the wetlands and we’ll slowly be working our way downstream during the spring and summer months. We are proposing to pop-in to see our BC neighbours, early evening between 5 - 6pm. Please feel free to come out and see us putting a fish on your street drains and have a chat with us.

You may have noticed that we have not sent out our annual $20 subscription notice. This is because we are proposing to change how FOBC is structured. We will preserve our charitable status but will form a new trust which will be managed by appointed Trustees. As an incorporated society, on an annual basis we were required to hold a AGM and elect people to specific positions. To be a member of FOBC required the payment of an annual sub.

The sending out of notices, collecting membership subscriptions, and recording who had paid and who had not, required an onerous amount of administration time. Furthermore, only paid up members could vote at the annual AGM.

Under the proposed structure, we will encourage supporters of FOBC to make a tax deductible donation, as an alternative to an annual subscription.

We are hoping that the change in structure will not have a material impact on the monies kindly donated to FOBC to continue with the site restoration.

We are in the process of applying for a new trust structure. Once this has been completed, we will be required to hold a Special General Meeting to vote to wind up Friends of Bullock Creek Incorporated, and transfer all monies and assets to the Friends of Bullock Creek Trust.

We will be holding a Special General Meeting of all FOBC Inc., members on Saturday 11 November 4:30PM at the Bullock Creek Wetlands. Formal notification of the Special General Meeting will be circulated by email to all members and also advertised in the local papers. Mark the date in your calendar.

If you have any questions or concerns about this change in structure please contact Roger Gardiner, FOBC Secretary 021 117 7220

In case you missed it, here’s the link to the FOBC email to members detailing recent correspondence with QLDC.

FOBC and our Community Stakeholders continue to express our extreme disappointment with QLDC's lack of urgent and substantive commitment to protecting our fresh water bodies in the Roy's Bay catchment.

NEXT STEPS…

Our plan is to discuss QLDC's response at our next Friends of Bullock Creek committee meeting. We will also liaise with our Community Stakeholders, to work out what actions we can take going forward. It is proposed that our actions will be to get traction for local government investment in infrastructure and operational initiatives for freshwater protection and look forward to the continue support of our FOBC Members.

big thanks to our volunteers!

Incredibly, despite the miserable cold inversion days, our dedicated FOBC volunteers are continuing to plant up the wetlands. Paul van Klink has been amazed at the hardy souls who don their warmest gear and gardening gloves and head to the Wetlands on a Thursday afternoon. Thanks also to Brian Anderson for the recent use of his mini-digger.

During winter months volunteer sessions are held 2 - 4PM at the Bullock Creek Wetlands. If you’d like to get involved or have any questions, don’t hesitate to call Paul 021 0569 146.

WATER QUALITY Vs. HOUSING

Regardless of your views whether or not we need more housing in Wanaka - this month sees a real push by QLDC :

• to open new areas up for housing development: Spatial Plan 2024 Gen 2.0 - Call for urban growth sites: https://letstalk.qldc.govt.nz/spatial-plan-2024-gen-2

• and make district planning changes for the intensification of existing residential areas. Variation to Proposed District Plan - Urban Intensification

The question is: "Can this development be done in a way to ensure no further contamination of our precious Bullock Creek and Lake Wanaka?"

FOBC will be submitting on the QLDC Spatial Plan to ensure that our views regarding the importance of fit for purpose urban stormwater management are recorded. Submissions close on 16 July.

If you'd like to support our submission (or make your own) more details will be posted in this News Section of the FOBC website in the week 3 - 10 July. You can also make your own submission via the QLDC Lets Talk portal - click here.

Also coming down the line in mid July is a variation to the Proposed District Plan regarding Urban Intensification. Importantly many of the areas proposed for intensification are directly south of the headwaters of Bullock Creek and will impact the creek’s health if not managed well.

Further information

• Map showing areas in Wanaka affected - click here and go to Map 4

• Interesting news article from law firm Todd & Walker summarising some of the proposed changes

HAVE YOU SEEN OUR NEW ALL WEATHER NOTICEBOARD YET?

Thanks to the handy work of Roger Gardiner and Paul van Klink, we now have an all-weather noticeboard at the Stone St entrance to Bullock Creek. At the moment, we have our planting day information there, but keep your eyes for other information about our doings if you’re a regular visitor.

FOBC recently attended and gave their input to a workshop facilitated by Wai Wanaka and held at the Lake Wanaka Centre on 14 June. Over 50 people representing a broad range of environmental groups and government agencies (ORC and DOC) from the UC Catchment Area attended. An UC Community Board member, Linda Joll, also attended.

Overall the workshop was very well run, but at this stage, the Draft Strategy is in a very early stage of development. The most impressive aspect of the Workshop was the turnout and level of engagement of the attendees.

Further Background about the workshop:

An expert reference group, led by Emeritus professor David Norton, has produced a draft Biodiversity Strategy, and is seeking input and feedback from those working in the UC Biodiversity space. [ Also see a copy of the powerpoint presentation here.]

The overall objective of the strategy is to sustain and enhance our unique native biodiversity by:

• co-ordinating and prioritising the efforts of the many organisations and individuals restoring, maintaining, protecting and enhancing the indigenous biodiversity of the Upper Clutha,

• connecting residents and visitors to our unique biodiversity, increasing their knowledge and encouraging them to get involved,

• assisting with funding applications by connecting work in with larger strategy,

• and providing learning opportunities.

  By the end of this workshop the aim was to have:

• Feedback and input from a large number of the community involved in environmental activities,

• Agreed priorities for the management goals,

• Ideas for communicating the strategy once finalised.

FOBC is continuing to strengthen its connections with environmental groups and agencies, particularly those with expertise in the urban space. In accordance with our charter we continue to work and advocate for the restoration and enhancement of Bullock Creek and the preservation of its water quality into the future.

We are looking forward to seeing the next draft of the proposed strategy. Please don’t hesitate to contact us if you have any input on this proposed strategy or you would like to be involved in the process.

A LITTLE BIT OF HISTORY …FROM 30 YEARS AGO

NOTE from Andy : Please excuse the poor quality of the video production, I just took photos of the pages on the mobile phone and stitched them together!

Jenny Moss recently gifted Roger Gardiner with a couple of school project books detailing a school adventure down Bullock Creek in 1993.

Please let us know if you recognise any of the young people in the photos…now 30 years on! And while you’re at it please forward any worthy historical or recent images you may have of Bullock Creek and we’ll keep them in our archives!

There’s koura in the creek!

Freshwater koura in Bullock Creek

A note from Andy Oxley- our NEW Admin Assistant

“Bullock Creek never ceases to surprise! As the new gal on the block, I wasn't sure whether seeing a koura was a big deal, so I checked with Paul van Klink our Fish & Game expert and he confirmed that he had never seen one before.”

“A keen eyed resident on Bullock Creek spied this beauty and kindly sent FOBC some images and footage. Intrigued, i forwarded these images to Professor Gerry Closs - Zoology Dept. at the University of Otago to see what he thought and also to add the sightings to the Otago freshwater fauna database.”

From: Gerard Closs <gerry.closs@otago.ac.nz>
Sent: Monday, June 19, 2023 1:53 PM
To: FOBC Incorporated <info@fobc.kiwi>
Subject: Fwd: Kōura

 Hi Andy

Here are the records on the Freshwater Fish Database for koura in Bullock Creek. It does look like the koura in Bullock Creek are the only ones in the Wanaka area. Is that significant???  Hard to say, given that koura have been moved around quite widely. People keep them as pets and then let them go. Māori moved them around for food as well.

So, I’d say interesting, potentially a bit significant, but also not that surprising as they do turn up regularly in odd places. That said, nice to have a population in Wānaka.

All the best

Gerry

Begin forwarded message:

From: Ryan Easton <ryan.easton@postgrad.otago.ac.nz>
Subject: RE: Kōura
Date: 19 June 2023 at 11:30:41 AM NZST
To: Gerard Closs <gerry.closs@otago.ac.nz>
Kia ora Gerry,

 So there are only two records for bullock creek in the database, both in 2019, with ORC doing hand netting and Wildlands e-fishing. ORC recorded koaro only, and Wildlands koaro, brown trout and rainbow trout. No records of koura anywhere close to Wanaka

Cheers,

Ryan

“Interesting stuff - hey?!?”

Don’t hesitate to snap & send us a photo of anything that you think we might find interesting in and around Bullock Creek.

It’s been quite a week for FOBC in the press. Press coverage has been received from all the major local media outlets for our protest against the 7 year deferral by QLDC of the $6M stormwater remediation works for Bullock Creek. Here’s a wrap up of the articles - just click on the images below to read the full story.

Wanaka Sun 26 May 2023

Wanaka Sun 26 May 2023

ODT 23 May 2023

Crux 22 May 2023

ODT 20/05/2023

Wanaka App 22 May 2023

Wanaka App 24 May 2023

Source: F&G Council Facebook Post 19 May 2023

The Otago Fish and Game Council have added their voice to the FOBC calls for the promised $6M remedial works to be re-instated in the QLDC Annual Plan.

A media release by the Otago Fish and Game Council has been made today and should appear in the ODT. A full copy of which you can read here, but in summary:

Hearings on the QLDC Annual Plan are being held this coming Monday 22 May in the Armstrong Room at Lake Wanaka Centre. Nancy Latham will be presenting the FOBC submission. Please come and support her if you have a moment.