20 May 2007

Ian Wells Track

formerly Auxiliary Dam Track, or Upper Nihotupu Track

page 2

Initially, the track is pleasant and undemanding, level for the most part, and covered in the typical leaf litter you expect on level terrain.

You can see the open nature of the bush, with 5-6 m seeing off the tallest trees for the most part

Punga and other ferns are lush

Toitoi appears whenever the track becomes slightly more open, but after a little while, we are walking through a much taller and closer together kanuka canopy.

The edge of the track is thick with young plants - especially rewarewa, Coprosma grandifolia, karamu and mingimingi

Kiokio and punga reach out as we pass, and the miniature tree fern, Blechnum fraserii, is also common along the edge of the track.

I pass what I at first take for one of the divaricate small-leaved Coprosmas but there's something not quite right and when I take a closer look, the leaves have a small serration where Coprosma does not. A little research later on concludes it is probably Pseudopanax anomalus, looking nothing like its brothers the lancewood and the pate, both of which are generously represented in this somewhat scrubby bush.

(In fact, when I do a bit more research on the NZ Plant Conservation Network site - usually the best authority for current names - I discover that in the last few years it has been shifted out of this genus and re-named Raukaua anomalus.)

Also common along here, though with few mature specimens, is Alseuosmia macrophylla, the northern karapapa. When these are in flower, the Upper Kauri Track from the Cascades is well worth a visit for their perfume precedes them by metres down a path.

I think I've already seen more rimu on this track than on the last three combined!

A young mapau (Myrsine australis) is one of many along here, with a number of quite large specimens.

These are common along the more open and scrubby sections of track

Palm leaf ferns (kiokio) lend their own individual lushness to the track.

These I can't get a name for at present, (lycopodium species?) nor for their slightly more whipcord looking cousins below

If you stare into these closely for a bit they tend to trap you in their intricacy.

Off to the side a small poison bait station.