Limestone Island

Thanks to my friend, Chris, I had the opportunity to go on a boat trip to Matakohe-Limestone Island, which sits in the Whangarei Harbour.  

 

 The M.V Waipapa docked at the island

All the boat day trippers were senior folk so the trip wasn't planned for physical activity. I would have liked to have a bit more time to wander around but I enjoyed the talk by the ranger and the time we had amongst the ruins of the old cement works. Also on the island are a couple of shipwrecks, the remains of an old school and cement works manager's home.

Originally the island was a strategic Maori Pa (Maori village defensive settlement). The little island (37 ha, just over 90 acres) has an interesting history. It lays claim to the first cement made in the Southern Hemisphere being produced there 1881 and being a thriving cement works until around 1918, when most of the buildings and equipment were moved to nearby Portland on the mainland. The island was then farmed before passing into the ownership of the Northland Harbour Board.  Portland Cement, which can be easily seen from the island, is still a major sponsor for ongoing rehabilitation on the island.

The old and the new - Portland Cement in the distance, on the left.

At one stage there were 250 workers at the cement works, 200 residents on the island.   The only human resident now are the ranger and her partner who kayaks back and forth across the harbour daily to his job off the island.  There is a flock of half a dozen sheep which keep the grass down around the ruins.

 

All that industry and later neglect left the island much worse for wear - in 1960s the island was in a degraded state with only a handful of trees remaining. Its main visitors were ships coming into port who dropped off their rubbish to be burnt in the quarantine incinerator located on the island!

Luckily a group of passionate members of the local community came along with a vision of seeing Matakohe-Limestone returned to its former glory. They became Friends of Matakohe–Limestone Island Society and have transformed the island into a regenerating forest habitat. They have planted 155,000 native trees to date and their work continues. Mammalian predators have been eradicated from the island, meaning this ‘new’ forest is now a safe home for a growing variety of threatened native fauna that have been re-introduced.