Conservancy Days

DOC Conservancy Days

There are 11 conservancies, or regions, of DOC.  I work for one of the regions, the West Coast Conservancy.  There are 5 districts in the West Coast Conservancy.  This conservancy is long and narrow.  Hokitika, where I work, is smack in the middle of the Conservancy and the area we serve extends from a 3 ½ hour drive north of Hokitika to a 3 ½ hour drive south of Hokitika. 

Conservancy Days is a two day event where employees from the entire Conservancy go to one district to do service projects, network and socialize.   Conservancy Days occur once per year and they are held at each district on a rotating basis.  This year was Hokitika’s turn to host. 

 

We started at 10 AM on Thursday to give people a chance to travel Thursday morning.  We all met at the golf club and divided into eight or so different groups to work on our projects.   

I was assigned to “free plants” at one of the DOC sites near the office.  There were about 16 of us assigned to this site.  Some people spread gavel on trails, others operated small equipment, and others weeded and placed weed mats around young trees that had been planted one or two years earlier.  Other projects included work on DOC and non-DOC sites all used by the community.   For example, one project repainted the exterior wall of the Regent Theater, a historic movie and event theater that is community operated.   

Gathering up into groups for work assignments - note that a very, very typical work outfit around here is gumboots (shin high rubber boots) short short canvas shorts (guys) and a wool sweater. 

Cabbage tree and Kath

Rata Tree Before....

...and after.  I "freed" the tree.  Go rata tree, be FREE, grow TALL.  Southern rata is a special native tree. Like my DOC hat?

 

Lunch Break!

We worked until 4 or so, and then met at the local golf club for drinks, volleyball and dinner.  Dinner was prepared by the Holitika wildlife management staff.  Wildlife managers’ job here is to go out and hunt to kill non-native deer and goats, which are pests because they kill the birds, flora and fauna of New Zealand.  The hunter dudes cooked an incredible dinner for all of us, I’m sure some of it was meat they had shot. 

After dinner, each district showed a power point presentation telling the rest of us about their accomplishments for the year.  These were presented with typical kiwi humor and I got to see so much of the work the DOC does and the personalities of the people who work for DOC.  I left before the DOC band started playing at 10 or so.  I hear the party continued to the wee morning hours.  

I volunteered for breakfast duty and went early to help prepare breakfast for all.  A few people were just waking up and were ready for coffee. After a hearty breakfast everyone was divided into groups to work on cleaning up sections of the nearby beaches. 

That was a pretty easy job because the beaches are pretty clean around here!   However, someone in our group did have a major beach find. 

Beach clean up - not much but driftwood on this beach.

The big find was a buried refrigerator. These three were determined to remove it and dispose of it properly.  Their mission was accomplished.

 

There are a total of 3,000 employees at DOC, 325 work in the West Coast Conservancy, about 40 in Hokitika.  Compare this to 22,000 NPS employees, 6,000 IMR employees and 225 in our building in Lakewood.  So in regard to the number of employees, DOC and the West Coast Conservancy are much smaller than the NPS.  I imagine that makes something like Conservancy Days more feasible here than at the NPS, but it would be nice to have something similar at home.