Stock grazing muddies local waters

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BY JULIA WADE

With the government’s vision of cleaning up the country’s water areas by 2025 through their Action Plan for Healthy Waterways initiative, some locals have concerns for the state of water outlets flowing from Mangawhai’s numerous rural farms and lifestyle blocks which generally all lead to the harbour.

Included in the plan is the requirement to exclude livestock from lakes, wetlands and streams a metre wide, and while a number of rural landowners have taken protective measures such as riparian planting and fencing off waterways, some animals are still reportedly grazing hoof-high in H20.

Neighbours at odds
Over the last two years, owners of a local lifestyle property have watched as the creeks running through their lands have blurred from a clear flow to a trickling brown sludge with a blue oily sheen. The couple, who wish not to be named, have worked hard to remove acres of gorse and cultivate lush paddocks for their cows. They have also transplanted over 8000 native trees, plants and grasses with another 4000 planned, to establish wetlands, help stop erosion and provide shade, as well as erected electric fences to keep their animals from grazing in the streams.

However, due to neighbouring landowners allowing their livestock to graze freely next to and within the shared creek, their hard work is being undermined.

“There’s all this work been done on the harbour but we have all this pollution from landowners going into creeks and streams which flow into the estuary and feeds the mangroves,” the local lifestylers say. “It’s not pretty what we [humans] are doing.”

Environmental harm
According to Ministry of Primary Industries (MPI) when livestock are allowed to graze along or among waterways the animals can cause serious environmental harm including; damaging breeding grounds and habitats of native fish and aquatic insects as well as trample riparian vegetation; increase the spread of weeds and sediment which in turn smothers stream beds; and increase nutrients such as phosphorous and nitrogen which fosters algal blooms. Disease-causing bacteria, a direct source of pathogens, is also released into the water when animals defecate in creeks and streams.

Both farmers and lifestyle block owners who have stock grazing on land play a key role in protecting the quality of waterways and ecosystems with farming practises such as

stock exclusion, fencing and riparian planting, which is also beneficial to animal wellbeing, reducing injury, sickness and death, related to waterway access.

Coastal areas and waterways come under Northern Regional Council’s (NRC) governance, who state that freshwater flowing from private property is part of ‘a greater catchment system, which carries accumulated contaminants all the way to our coast, harbours and estuaries’.

Lack of enforcement
A NRC spokesperson says although currently livestock are legally allowed to graze in close proximity to rural fresh waterways, the council’s Proposed Regional Plan (PRP) for Northland will introduce new rules on the activity.

“The access of livestock to streams, rivers, drains, wetlands and lakes is a permitted activity subject to conditions, including that livestock are excluded from waterbodies over time,” he says. “It is an offence under the Resource Management Act to discharge contaminants into water. Council and farming industry bodies are working with landowners to remove stock access to rivers, streams, drains and wetlands.”

Local ecologists however have doubts regarding just how the PRP will be monitored, saying that even significant protected natural areas are still being used for grazing cattle.

“There is no legal protection on protected natural areas unless there is a conservation covenant or QE2 protection on the area, although even those areas are not often being monitored or enforced,” the ecologists say, who wish to not be identified due to possible conflict with business. “Councils know this is happening, we’ve been banging on to them for a couple of years saying ‘if that’s a protected natural area, why are there cows grazing in it?’ but it’s just the lack of resources of the council’s monitoring and compliance team to enforce it. The reality is a lot of these areas are on the brink of extinction because of livestock and flow-on effects from grazing.”

Damage recovery slow
The ecologist’s spend a substantial amount of time visiting private properties to assess prospective subdivisions and survey species, habitats and ecosystems. They say financial costs of fencing and planting, time-consuming, complicated funding applications for NRC’s Environmental Funding as well as the governments Billion Trees Project, lack of council enforcement and landowners either being unaware of the harm or adhering to archaic farming practices, are some of the main reasons why some landowners do not implement protective measures.

“One farmer said he allowed his cows to graze in the bush through summer for the shade, that it was an ‘SPCA issue’. However livestock are also allowed to graze the bush throughout winter so they don’t damage the ‘valuable’ pasture,” the ecologists say.

“Unrestricted stock access, and associated pugging and defecation, significantly damage native vegetation, soils, streams and springs within the bush area, and consequently

water quality and the ecosystem as a whole… research shows it can take up to 25 years for the bush to recover.”

Attitude change needed
Ironically, subdividing large blocks of land ‘is the only mechanism for protection of environmental features’ as landowners have to follow resource consent requirements such as stock exclusion, pest control and revegetation plantings.

Although welcoming of NRC’s changes to protect the waterways, the ecologists have doubts regarding the new rules being on target for the government’s 2025 clean waters deadline.

“We’re still looking at a five to ten year hangover of implementation of the plan… not many landowners will have done anything when the deadline hits as there has been little enforcement, education or guidance… there’s quite a lot of funding available but it’s not really being pushed by council and not many landowners are jumping on it,” they say. “Monitoring and enforcing the changes will be difficult… in the end, protecting Mangawhai’s creeks, stream and waterways, and ultimately the harbour, comes down to a change in individual’s attitudes.”
 

Funding assistance With NRC’s Environmental Funding, which helps with the costs of projects associated with protecting Northland’s natural ecosystems, council have granted over $1million to Kaipara landowners and completed 369 farm environment plans involving riparian fencing, soil conservation and wetland restoration between July 2013 and June 2019. “We’ve actively promoted and subsidised fencing waterways to exclude livestock, with over 267 kilometres of fencing throughout Northland from 2018 to date,” says a council spokesperson. “Once the PRP’s new rules are finalised by the court, council will implement, monitor and enforce compliance with the rules.” The new proposals ‘are currently going through the legal process’ the spokesperson says although due to several organisations appealing the modifications, ‘the timing and final outcomes could possibly change’. ¢ For more information on accessing funding to help protect Mangawhai waterways, visit Northern Regional Council Environment Funding at nrc.govt.nz

Local cows grazing next to or hoof-high in creeks and streams can cause a range of detrimental effects on the environment including disease-causing bacteria when animals defecate in the water. PHOTO/SUPPLIED

The result of animals grazing too close to waterways; instead of clear flowing waters, an oily sheen and brown sludge which eventually flows into Mangawhai’s harbour. PHOTO/JULIA WADE

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