Search

found 5 results

Research Papers, Lincoln University

A city’s planted trees, the great majority of which are in private gardens, play a fundamental role in shaping a city’s wild ecology, ecosystem functioning, and ecosystem services. However, studying tree diversity across a city’s many thousands of separate private gardens is logistically challenging. After the disastrous 2010–2011 earthquakes in Christchurch, New Zealand, over 7,000 homes were abandoned and a botanical survey of these gardens was contracted by the Government’s Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority (CERA) prior to buildings being demolished. This unprecedented access to private gardens across the 443.9 hectares ‘Residential Red Zone’ area of eastern Christchurch is a unique opportunity to explore the composition of trees in private gardens across a large area of a New Zealand city. We analysed these survey data to describe the effects of housing age, socio-economics, human population density, and general soil quality, on tree abundance, species richness, and the proportion of indigenous and exotic species. We found that while most of the tree species were exotic, about half of the individual trees were local native species. There is an increasing realisation of the native tree species values among Christchurch citizens and gardens in more recent areas of housing had a higher proportion of smaller/younger native trees. However, the same sites had proportionately more exotic trees, by species and individuals, amongst their larger planted trees than older areas of housing. The majority of the species, and individuals, of the larger (≥10 cm DBH) trees planted in gardens still tend to be exotic species. In newer suburbs, gardens in wealthy areas had more native trees than gardens from poorer areas, while in older suburbs, poorer areas had more native big trees than wealthy areas. In combination, these describe, in detail unparalleled for at least in New Zealand, how the tree infrastructure of the city varies in space and time. This lays the groundwork for better understanding of how wildlife distribution and abundance, wild plant regeneration, and ecosystem services, are affected by the city’s trees.

Images, UC QuakeStudies

The stump of an oak tree in the Halswell Primary School grounds. The oak tree had the be cut down after it broke during the earthquake and was hanging at a angle. The person who cut down the tree has carved "1870 - 16:9:2010" into the stump, the year that the tree was planted, and then the day that it broke and fell.

Images, UC QuakeStudies

A scanned copy of a photograph of the garden of Di Madgin's former home in the Red Zone, taken before the earthquakes. She describes the scene in the photograph as, "This is the courtyard that we made, to have an eating place at the back of the house. The tree in the neighbours' was a tree that Pete's brother stole on a school trip up in the mountains from a national park. They planted this red beech in the garden. It became the neighbourhood bird tree and the sound was fantastic in the evenings."

Images, UC QuakeStudies

An aerial photograph of Manchester Street near Cambridge Terrace. The photograph has been captioned by BeckerFraserPhotos, "The new Christchurch emerges - more colourful than before. The tree wrapped in high visibility is another project from artist Peter Majendie. The newly planted grass on the right hand side of the photo is on the PGC site and an adjoining site and is a CERA initiative. In the foreground of the photos the former site of St Luke's is now attractively laid out, while the splendour of the trees on the site can be fully appreciated".

Images, UC QuakeStudies

Damage to the garden of a house in Richmond. Liquefaction is visible among the plants and on the driveway, and the driveway is badly cracked. The photographer comments, "These photos show our old house in River Rd. Water and silt have flattened the long grass in the back garden. The growth right of centre is suckers growing from the stump of a prunus tree we had felled last year. The section of fence between us and our neighbour fell down in the Sep 4 quake".