Went for a 7 hour bush walk yesterday with Stephan the trapper.
Another belting day out. Good conversation, plenty of new plants and animals to look at. Stephan wa working as we walked round the 200 acre block of bush, checking and resetting traps that had caught a couple of hedgehogs and a rat. The block has been trapped for several years to reduce predator numbers so that kiwi, other native birds and animals can live unmolested.
For those who are interested, the black olive looking fruit is from a tree called the taraire. The white daisy like flowers are from Kirk's tree daisy, the butterfly on the ragwort is a small copper. The smiling bloke is Stephan. A man who enjoys his work!
We got back to his house in time for a refreshing dip and then we were called out to do a search and rescue for an 87 year old neighbour who had not come back from his bush walk. The police had scrambled a team from Whangarei by chopper. The local SAR team assembled from all over the Far North. Meanwhile the ragtaggle team of local police and neighbours did an initial sweep through the bush close to his abandoned quad bike. We were about to go back to HQ, when Ruth spotted the guy wandering up a track out of the bush. He looked a bit bemused to see nigh on 40 people gathered in his back garden! All's well that ends well.
