From Green Bay to Gondwanaland - a 250 million year history of my backyard. Nigel Brookes What follows are fragments of a curious history. From scraps of information scattered on the internet and throughout many libraries, together with explorations of the neighbourhood, I have constructed a detailed portrait of my backyard in Auckland's Waitakere City, that stretches backwards through European settlement, pre-European Maori history, to ancient times before human colonisation, and ultimately to the land's origins on the coast of Gondwanaland 250 million years ago. - Now A few short years ago my family moved to Green Bay in Auckland's Waitakere City - into a broad valley roughly extending from the Titirangi Road ridge east to Portage Road, and from Golf Road south to the Manukau coast. I was keen to find out more of the history of the area, and as a biologist I was particularly attracted to the many varied natural environments close to my new home. My neighbourhood is now suburbia - I wanted to know who cut down the forest? New Zealand is unique in the world as the last significant land to be discovered by humans. Green Bay itself is an edge zone between what remains of that wild nature and modern urban technology - on the edge of suburbia, the Waitakere bush, and the Manukau coast. Portage Road marks the border between Waitakere City and Auckland City - it was also both a passage and a border before the Europeans came, when Auckland was called Tamaki-Makau-Rau. On a walk through the Rahui Kahika reserve guided by several local botanists, some of the giant 300-year-old kahikatea that give the reserve its name were pointed out. I couldn't help but be amazed that such stands of bush exist here at all given the history of the area. Here in our own neighbourhood was a living link to an earlier time, and one that predates European colonisation. We learned that nestled in the craggy branches of these trees are other plants, like an epiphytic orchid that is rare in the Waitakere Ranges. Effectively these trees are host to fragments of an ecosystem that can be traced all the way back to Gondwanaland. - 20th Century My house was built in 1974, in one of the last big gasps of subdivision at the Titirangi end of the valley. This process increasingly intensified in the area after World War II, and indeed continues to this day, although in a more managed way. In Auckland City Libraries excellent Heritage Collection of photos I found a panoramic series taken by James D. Richardson in 1920, from Henry Atkinson's house at the top of the hill above my house. Although you can see right across Auckland, it is the foreground that is the most interesting. The future suburbia of Green Bay is farmland with pockets of bush, including the slightly younger kahikatea. In another photo taken by the same photographer fourteen years later from a similar vantage point, signs of change are already apparent, such as better roads to accommodate the motorcar. Classics professor and popular writer E. M. Blaiklock (Grammaticus) lived in one of these farms as a young boy between about 1910-20. Inside the front cover of one of his collections of autobiographical writing is a fascinating map of the farm between Golf and Godley Roads, from the corner of Green Bay School, down towards where the Green Bay shops are today. In his books he writes extensively about his boyhood wonderland, with much rich description of the area before suburbia took over. Lena Godley bought the Pinesong property across the valley in December 1907. The Godley's worked hard to build a house and develop the property, but the dream ended when Captain Godley tragically hung himself in the house. In 1911 the property was then divided into north and south sections through forming Avonleigh Road and back on the market, to be bought by New Lynn brickmakers Charles and Ryce Gardner, who owned it for the next thirty years. - 19th Century The 'Whau Highway District' remained largely wilderness up until the 1880's, when the population was about 270. On March 29th 1880 the Auckland - Helensville Railway was opened with a stop at New Lynn. At the time there were 2 mixed trains to Avondale every day except Sunday, continuing through to Glen Eden on Tuesdays and Fridays. "...although that advantage was tempered somewhat by the two miles (three kilometres) of clay roads and tracks to the bay on the Manukau. In May 1882 a Crown Grant was signed by the Governor to confirm Paul Joseph Murray as owner of Lot 293, a 40-acre block that included the property known today as Pinesong and also extending over the ridge of the present-day Avonleigh Road to the northwest slope beyond. Murphy sold out within 12 months and the remote property changed hands a further three times in the next 20 years. Splendid views of the Manukau could not offset the reality that the land, with its thick clay base and with topsoil depleted by the nature of the Kauri, was resistant to cultivation." Patricia Carr, Last Waltz For Iconic Venue, Titirangi Tatler 39, 2006. The Blaiklock farm also had a forested gully and wetland - a continuation of the one in the Rahui Kahika reserve today. These areas better survived any forest fires that ravaged the more exposed parts of the isthmus. When Thomas Kirk published the first substantial record of the vegetation in Auckland in 1871, there were still remnants of forest in the gullies consisting mostly of mangaeo, puriri, pohutukawa, kanuka, toro, mapou, toru, rewarewa, hinau, pigeonwood, and kauri. The gumlands carried low-growing manuka, tauhinu, Dracophyllum sinclairii, and two species of umbrella fern. The local kahikatea must have been there too. Prior to about 1870 the entire district including the Titirangi - Green Bay - Blockhouse Bay region was called 'The Whau'. The name comes from the Whau tree (Entelea arborescens) - wood prized by Maori for use as fishing floats. The Blockhouse Bay military blockhouse was completed in July 1860 overlooking the old Te Whau pa on a traditional route from the portage. Via a coastal path this route connected to other fortifications further west at Cornwallis. The same year, Great North Road was also formed as a military transport route. The beginnings of local government were also developed at this time. In 1866 the 'Turnpike Act' was passed to finance better roads via tollgates, of which there were three in the western districts. In 1868 the 'Whau Highway District Board' was formed, followed on 2 June 1869 by the creation of the 'Whau Educational District'. In reality the process of subdivision had been going on since the Maori sold their ancestral land to the first European settlers soon after the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi. Also in the Auckland City Libraries collection is an old map of the area made in the 1863. Only today's main roads are visible, and most peter out as they approach Titirangi. On 5th August 1859 there was another auction of crown 'waste lands' by the Provincial Council. There were 200 lots averaging ?5 per quarter acre in 'Whau Township, South'. The Austrian geologist Ferdinand von Ritter Hochstetter visited Auckland in 1859, and later published several things, including a beautiful map of the geology and a book of his travels: "I have seen beautiful Kauri woods in the coast range West of Auckland, in the Titirangi chain, on the Waitakeri, in Henderson Bush and in the Huia on the Manukau Harbour... The crowns of the Kauri pines rise far above the rest of the forest trees, and produce dark shades upon the slopes of the mountains and in the valleys, here and there intersected by the light green stripes of fern trees... They often occupy several square miles; sometimes there are 30 or 40 trees clustered together which thus, mutually protecting each other, thrive splendidly... tree by tree rises of equal thickness and of equal height, like pillars in the halls of a cathedral. In these clumps the Kauri pine suffers no larger forest trees by its side... Whether it is the Kauri forests extract from the soil all the ingredients requisite for the growth of no other plants, or that they really grow only upon a soil productive of nothing else: this much is a matter of fact, that those tracks in the vicinity of Auckland which formerly were covered with dense Kauri forests, and where large masses of Kauri gum are dug from the earth, present now nothing, but waste, dreary, sunburnt heaths of notorious sterility, upon the white or yellowish clay-soil of which nothing but dwarfish manuka shrubs and scanty ferns can grow." Dick Scott, Fire On The Clay - The Pakeha Comes To West Auckland, Southern Cross Books, Auckland, 1979. "About 1853, George Denyer moved across the Whau creek and took up land on slopes running up to Titirangi, and for a time he and the other members of the family engaged in pit-sawing the kauri growing on these slopes and cutting firewood. By 1868, there were five Denyer families living in or around New Lynn. George Senior had a farm down on the flat; John was living in a house on the Great North Road near the original Whau bridge, while the others, Fred, Arthur and George Junior, were living up towards Titirangi. By this time the others had purchased all the land now bounded by Golf Road, Hutchinson, Gardner and Astley Avenue, as well as a block on the opposite side of Golf Road." John T. Diamond, Once The Wilderness, Lodestar Press, 1977. Other early settlers included Thomas Bray, who bought 73 acres in Titirangi also in 1853, and Hybernia Smyth, who bought 550 acres on the slopes beneath Mt Atkinson between 1854-57. Maybe these early settlers clear-felled the timber in my backyard? The crown also sold a number of timber licenses at this time. In 1854 the wood of the ancient Titirangi forest was sold to Benjamin Holland. The following year John Bishop obtained a license to cut down the forest in the Whau portage. The timber was sent straight by boat to Onehunga and beyond. Most of the early settlements beyond Auckland were situated on the coast or navigable creeks. Of course the timber cutters were closely followed by the gum diggers, who even further modified the landscape. By the late 1850's all the timber was cut and the whole area was slowly being turned into farmland. A letter to 'The New Zealander' in January 1860 describes the view from the top of Mt Atkinson looking back toward Auckland as "...clay showing everywhere with hardly a tree or cultivated field..." The view west was still at least partially forested. "When the barque 'Helena' was wrecked on Te Henga beach in 1853, the survivors were guided by local Maoris along a track from Te Henga to Three Kings. Drury (1854) states that 'it is one days hard walk from Waitakere (Te Henga) to Three Kings'. The exact route is unknown but presumably followed a ridge due east of the beach, went over the Waitakere River and Scenic Drive ridge and met with the Kaipara - Whau track." B. W. Hayward and J. T. Diamond, Prehistoric Archaeological Sites of the Waitakere Ranges and West Auckland, New Zealand, Auckland Regional Authority, 1978, p96. In 1850, the short-lived 'Hundreds' system of local authority was introduced, seeing Governor Hobson's old 'County of Eden' split into six parts, each with a hundred families and a warden to oversee them. 'Whau Township, North' (Avondale), and 'Whau Township, South' (Blockhouse Bay) were mapped out in a neat grid of streets and allotments, together with plans for a Whau canal to connect the two harbours. In 1853 the Auckland Provincial Council was formed to fund schools, libraries and other public amenities. In 1854 a bridge was built over Oakley creek from Mount Albert to form part of the 'Whau Highway'. In 1848 the crown negotiated purchase of Te Whau, Titirangi and Nihotupu from Ngati Whatua. In the same year, John Kelly was the first to legally buy land in the area - Titirangi Lot 2. "Much has been made of the fact that the site of Auckland was purchased for blankets and axes, but New Lynn can consider itself superior - after all the cutter 'Oripia', two cloaks, one gold watch, one double-barrelled pistol, one bag of flour, one bag of sugar, six sheets, six pairs of trousers, five coats, ten blankets and fifty pounds of money changed hands when the Porter family purchased land that today includes Titirangi, New Lynn and Kelston from the Maori chiefs Te Kawau and Te Rangi..." John T. Diamond, Once The Wilderness, Lodestar Press, 1977. In 1845, Dr Pollen built a gate across the Whau creek at the end of the Rosebank peninsula to prevent Maori warriors from coming up the creek. However it now appears that these people weren't the first Europeans to buy the land from the Maori people. For example, in 1843, John Shedden Adam (1822-1906) was granted Allotment 85 in the Parish of Titirangi / Whau in return for his land shares in the failed Cornwallis settlement - one acre of crown 'waste lands' for four from Cornwallis. In January 1842, missionary-explorer William Colenso crossed the Manukau by canoe landing at Green Bay. He headed on foot for the Kaipara along the old track that headed north through the Waitakere foothills. Colenso recorded in his journal: "We travelled on, over open and barren heaths, in a northerly direction til sunset. Observed nothing new in these dreary and sterile wilds (save a handsome shrubby Dracophyllum). Bivouacked for the night in a little dell, nestling among the close growing manuka, not a stick being anywhere within ken large enough to serve as a tent pole." Dick Scott, Fire On The Clay - The Pakeha Comes To West Auckland, Southern Cross Books, Auckland, 1979. The same year Governor Hobson proclaimed the creation of the 'County of Eden' - a framework of authority over the first landowners across Auckland. Unfortunately he died before anything was established. "From the early 1840's the road to Titirangi was via Blockhouse Bay across the upper reaches of the Whau creek, along the ridge (which is now Golf Road) across the present Titirangi Road and down to Atkinson valley then up the hill to Titirangi." John T. Diamond, Once the Wilderness, Lodestar Press, 1977. - Pre-Treaty Perhaps these early settlers didn't clear fell the timber in my backyard? It seems that large tracts of the area may have already been deforested before the Europeans even arrived, and Green Bay was kauri gumland like most of the Waitakere foothills, covered in windswept fern and manuka/kanuka scrub, backing onto the still densely wooded Waitakere Ranges. "Wade describes the route he was led over in 1838, when walking between the Kaipara and Manukau Harbours. The northern section followed the Riverhead Portage which was left near Kumeu. From here 'the path passed over short easy hills with white clayey soils and kauri resin ... the track was 4-5 miles from the west coast with a view of the Waitemata to the east not far away...' and finally met the Whau Portage. The description is of a track passing over the eastern foothills of the Waitakere Ranges, roughly in a line joining present-day Kumeu, Taupaki, Waitakere, Swanson, Henderson Valley, Oratia and Titirangi Golf Course." B. W. Hayward and J. T. Diamond, Prehistoric Archaeological Sites of the Waitakere Ranges and West Auckland, New Zealand, Auckland Regional Authority, 1978, p95. "Occasionally we had to pass through narrow lines of kauri wood, which crossed our path. The kauri here appeared of a much less aspiring growth than in a more northern latitude. The short swamps which came in our way were not serious impediments, and on the whole, we found the road from Kaipara to Manukau easy travelling... I was on ahead, with two or three of the lads, when some of the hindermost ones struck off into a path to the left, and were proceeding on before we were aware of it. We had therefore to beat our way through the bush, which proved excessively fatiguing, and completely wore out my upper leathers. We now had Manukau in sight, and soon arrived at the road over which the natives drag their canoes. There is a remarkable facility of water conveyance in this part of the Island. With perfect ease canoes can be dragged over the short distances between one river and another; so that the tribes of the Thames on the east coast can pass over to Manukau on the west, and thence on to Waikato. From Waitamata, in the Thames, canoes are brought to Manukau over the dragging-place on which we were travelling. Crossing Manukau harbour, they pass up a river or creek, which brings them within so short a distance of the Awaroa, a branch of the Waikato river, that another easy drag puts them in a position either to go out to sea by Waikato heads, or to paddle on beyond Mangapouri, upwards of a hundred miles up the river." William R. Wade, A Journey in the Northern Island of New Zealand, 1842. The first recorded land sale actually took place before the Treaty of Waitangi was even signed: "The lands which we now know as Avondale, Waterview and Blockhouse Bay had been included in a sales deed dated 11th January 1836 between Thomas Mitchell - an entrepreneur originally from New South Wales but based in the Hokianga, and Apihai Te Kawau of Ngati Whatua Nga Oho, Wetere Te Kaue of Ngati Tamahoa Waiohua, Te Tinana and Tamaki Rewiti. This was later brought under dispute in 1840 as it had been made prior to the Treaty of Waitangi, and not approved by the government land commissioners." John Lifton, Cornwallis, 2002, p16-17. Thomas Mitchell sailed into the Manukau harbour on board the Fanny, captained by Captain Thomas Wing, who later became the first Manukau harbourmaster. Along with them was Reverend William White, who brokered the deal with Ngati Whatua, and waxed fancifully about the idyllic surroundings: "Near the source of these rivers, the Cowdy timber is found in the greatest perfection, and in this delightful district are to be met with some of the most sublime and romantic scenery the eye of the admirer of the picturesque beauties of nature need desire - mountains with their snow-clad summits, whose sides are covered with gigantic trees - rivers with their innumerable cataracts and lakes, and rich and beautiful valleys..." William White, Important information relative to New Zealand, Sydney, T. Brennard, 1839. However in a letter later on that same year, the then south Manukau-based missionary William Woon let slip the real motivation for the vast land purchase: "It is expected that several Englishmen, traders, will take up their residence in this harbour, as on the north side there are large and extensive forests of timber, a greater part of which has been already purchased and no doubt vessels will be here to fetch it for the Sydney and Hobart Town markets." William Woon, In T. B. Byrne, Wing of the Manukau, Auckland, 1991, p61. The first Europeans known to pass through Green Bay were missionaries James Hamlin and Arthur Nesbitt Brown. Travelling from Waimate to the Waikato with a party of nineteen Maori, they reached Green Bay on 12 March 1834, and camped the night before carrying on across the Manukau by canoe. According to Hamlin's diary, they had a terrible time on the beach and in the fern, despite the fine weather. At this time no Maori were living in the Auckland isthmus out of fear. The Ngati Whatua had been decimated and scattered by invading Northland tribes seeking revenge for earlier injustices during the musket wars. "In 1827 Te Parawhau, under Tirarau, attacked Apihai and party at Waiaro near Mahurangi. Te Taou and Ngaoho fled to the mountains, then to Orewa, past Takapuna to Te Whau and to Woods? Island (Pahi) and then to Kopapaka (Henderson?s Mill) where they settled. At that time Te Uringutu were living with Ngati Paoa at Wharekawa. Te Taou and Ngaoho were then taken by Te Uringutu in Ngati Paoa canoes on to Haowhenua near Maungatautari, where they stayed until Ngati Paoa were expelled in 1831. Graham noted that Ngapuhi also attacked Te Aotea, Great Barrier Island, that year and killed Ngati Maru chief Te Maunu and his son Ngahua." R. Daamen, P. Hamer, B. Rigby, Waitangi Tribunal Rangahaua Whanui Series District 01 - Auckland, p79. Judge Fenton records that Ngapuhi dragged their waka through Te Whau portage in 1824, on their way to make peace with tribes in the Waikato. "The petty bickering between tribes all around the country at this time is well illustrated by a detailed account involving the Waitakeres, recorded by Heaphy (1862). Around 1800, a party of Waikato Maoris (Ngatiteata) raided the Coromandel Peninsula, killing many inhabitants at Kauaeranga, Opou, and Great Barrier. The Coromandel people planned their revenge and waited until the Ngatiteata (whose home was around Waiuku) were camped on the north Manukau shores, shark hunting with the Ngatiwhatua on the headwaters of the Waitemata around Whau and in the Manukau. The Coromandel Maoris left in the evening with eleven canoes full of warriors. They hid the first day at Ponui and then paddled to Rangitoto where they hid during the second day. That night they paddled up the Tamaki Estuary and over the portage to the Manukau and by early morning passed Onehunga on their way down the harbour. 'When we got off the tall cliffs which is the Whau (portage), their dogs barked, but those of the Waikato who first saw us, thought we were only some who had been also shark fishing and were coming down with the tide. More than half our people lay down in the bottoms of the canoes and the wind took us along quickly. The Waikato's canoes were drawn up on the beach between the cliffs and the drying place where their sharks were hanging on stages in great numbers; their old women were beginning to prepare their hangis. We sprang onto the beach before they were prepared for fighting, some ran to their canoes and some ran inland but we sent a party of our tribe over to the Waitemata side, while others of us were fighting on the beach and on the hillside.' They killed all they could find in both places." B. W. Hayward and J. T. Diamond, Prehistoric Archaeological Sites of the Waitakere Ranges and West Auckland, New Zealand, Auckland Regional Authority, 1978, p12. Judge Fenton recorded another battle in 1792 at Rangimatariki, a papakainga (village) at the end of the Rosebank Pensinsula, near the current-day Patiki Road interchange: "...in which Ngatipaoa were defeated with heavy loss: 'You may see hangis (ovens) to this day', says Tamati Tangiteruru. Apihai says that this engagement was to avenge the deaths at Mahurangi, but this can scarcely be, for Ngatipaoa appears to have been the attacking party." F. D. Fenton, Important Judgements 1866-1879 Delivered in the Compensation Courts and Native Land Courts, Orakei, Auckland, December 22, 1869. - Pre-European One of the things E. M. Blaiklock writes about in the middle of the 20th century are the old tracks that passed through his parents farm, and along the cliffs to the various secluded bays on the Manukau coast. These tracks seem to have been in use for years - long before the arrival of Europeans: "It was a padded footway with a surface of smooth hardened grey which always denotes a Maori track, polished to firm sterility by centuries of passing feet. Moss alone would grow there and when it was wet the grey clay was as slippery as ice. Such paths have never failed to interest me and this one was, I think, part of the great complex of tracks which led from the Waitemata to the Manukau in the Golden Age of Tamaki." E. M. Blaiklock, Ten Pounds An Acre, A. H. & A. W. Reed, 1965. "It ran, hard-padded clay, moss-grown at the edges,and hollowed down the middle by long years of rain, over the back road and the hill beyond, to a dent in the Manukau coastline, which we called Rocky Bay... The track ran as straight as natural obstacles allowed to its harbourside destination, a last surviving remnant of a trail which may have begun on the other side of the isthmus. Auckland's Karangahape Road, I am assured, is on the line of a ridge top track of the Orakei tribesmen. They would make for the Western Springs, then with a line on some Titirangi summit come on along the line of the Great North Road, circle the top end of the Whau estuary and join the other east-west track which is Godley Road." E. M. Blaiklock, Between The Valley And The Sea, The Dunmore Press, 1979. A line drawn down Godley or Golf Roads on a modern street map intersects directly with One Tree Hill (Maungakiekie) - from where Waiohua and their ancestors ruled the region for hundreds of years until conquered by Ngati Whatua in about 1750. Likewise, it's possible that E. M. Blaiklock's old track could have been a secondary portage slightly further west than Te Whau, connecting the Rewarewa creek at New Lynn with the Manukau coast. The main track up to Titirangi through the Rahui Kahika reserve might also be a vestige of these times. Te Whau was governed at Green Bay by twin pa on either side of the Manukau entrance. Whoever controlled these pa were gatekeepers across this part of the isthmus. Most important was the eastern headland now called Te Whau point, occupying a commanding position overlooking the portage, Blockhouse Bay, and across the Manukau in all directions. As detailed in a New Zealand Historic Places Trust report in 1981, this pa was once terraced, with a large ditch that slowed access onto the headland. It is now greatly eroded. In its day it is estimated that about 200 people lived, worked, fought and died at Te Whau pa. The other pa, Karaka, was on the western side of the portage, although less detailed archaeological evidence now remains to tell us much about it. Karaka trees are common around pa sites because of their edible berries - Green Bay was called Karaka Bay on early maps. These pa appear on the map of Auckland prepared by Chief Judge Francis Dart Fenton in 1869 for the Native Land Court hearings, as part of his attempt to document the history of the isthmus and the Ngati Whatua claim at Orakei. They can also be seen on the edge of Hochstetter's 1859 map. Early ethnographer George Graham's seminal collection of Maori place names in Auckland records names for geographical features right throughout the course of Te Whau - from the Manukau to the Waitemata across the isthmus: "WAIROPA 'The slaves' water'. A channel in the Manukau Harbour off Karaka Bay. On the south side of the Mutukaraka sandbank. MUTUKARAKA 'The end of the karaka'. A sand bank in the Manukau Harbour off Green Bay. Also Motukaraka, "Island of Karaka". TE WHAU a shrub (Entelea aborescens). Tidal creek flowing into the Waitemata. Known as Whau Creek. The western headland off Blockhouse Bay, Manukau. KARAKA Name of a tree. A little bay on Maukau harbour in the vicinity of Green Bay to the west thereof. Actually Green Bay itself. WAITAHURANGI 'Fairy River'. A creek at the headwaters of the Whau creek on the western side. TE KOTUITANGA 'The dovetailing'. A creek at the headwaters of the Whau Creek on the eastern side. Builders of canoe attacked when dovetailing canoe. RANGIMATARIKI 'The day of the small spears'. Possibly name of battle. Also Rangi - sky; Matariki - Pleiades, a group of stars. The eastern headland of the Whau Creek. MOTUMANAWA 'The island of the Manawa shrub'. A large island at the mouth of the Whau Creek. Or Heart Island. Pollen Island." George Graham, Maori Place Names of Auckland compiled by David Simmons, In David Simmons, Maori Auckland, The Bush Press, Auckland, 1987. Archaelogical evidence seems to suggest that all the ditch-bearing pa sites along the north Manukau coast may have originally been built when Ngati Awa controlled the whole area in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Ngati Whatua swept through Te Whau in 1750 on their way to defeat Kiwi Tamaki's Waiohua. After this defeat Ngati Whatua consecrated many of the major pa as tapu and left them unoccupied. However, they were documented using at least one of the Green Bay pa in 1837. It may well have been in use up to 1863, when all Maori who were not loyal to Queen Victoria were exiled to the Waikato and their waka destroyed during the Maori Land Wars, seriously curtailing Maori trade throughout the Manukau. The flat area behind Titirangi beach was apparently used by local Maori up until about 1900. - Colonisation A further series of midden sites, suggesting temporary or more permanent camps, have been found dotted around the Manukau coast to other pa sites at Laingholm, Cornwallis and beyond. There are also middens right along the banks of the Whau creek. Most are filled with cockle and pipi shells, but some contain mud snails, cat's eyes, mud oysters and scallops as well. The Maori diet also included other seafood and birds: "In summer, parties of Maoris came from Auckland, the South Manukau and Waikato areas to camp on the north Manukau coastline and catch sharks. The sharks were cleaned and dried in the sun on racks for winter use. Fresh shark eggs were a delicacy if eaten raw and shark oil from their livers was particularly prized. Coastal birds that came in large flocks to feed on the intertidal harbour flats were also hunted. The chief among these was the kuaka (godwit), which was caught during March and April. Nooses made of cabbage tree leaves were strung across the feeding grounds at the mouth of the Whau, and at night the birds were frightened by torch-bearing Maoris that made them take off and get caught in the nooses above. At other times, Maoris would wait on the Whau saddle above Green Bay and club the low-flying kuaka to death as they flew in a flock between the Manukau and Waitemata Harbours with the changing tides." B. W. Hayward and J. T. Diamond, Prehistoric Archaeological Sites of the Waitakere Ranges and West Auckland, New Zealand, Auckland Regional Authority, 1978. Apparently, godwits were plentiful in the area right up to the 1870's. In 1879, John White was commissioned by the Government to compile an Official Maori History, seven volumes of which were published between 1887 and 1891. The other six volumes were never completed and remained in manuscript form. One of the volumes contains a series of his illustrations of Maori life, including one picture showing Maori snaring the kuaka in the air at Te Whau. He also left a manuscript containing a very detailed fictionalised account of Maori life in Auckland, including killing kuaka at Te Whau, published in 1940, long after his death, as 'Revenge - A Love Tale of the Mount Eden Tribe'. Judge Fenton's 1869 map of Auckland notes Te Whau as a pa of the Tao Ngaoho and Uringutu people. "Several recorded traditions tell of a chief named Oho Mairangi establishing a tribe called Ngaoho (Ngaoho I) at Tamaki. This is often placed in the 13th century, and Oho may have come on one of the first canoes. That brought the ancestors of the present day Maoris to New Zealand..." B. W. Hayward and J. T. Diamond, Prehistoric Archaeological Sites of the Waitakere Ranges and West Auckland, New Zealand, Auckland Regional Authority, 1978, p8. The descendents of Ngaoho included the Waiohua who controlled the region until defeated by Ngati Whatua in 1750. So maybe the forest in my backyard was razed as the Maori first occupied the isthmus, clearing the land of forest to encourage the edible bracken fern to grow, and making space for cultivating kumara and building their pa? Bracken fern keeps coming up in my backyard even today. - Pre-Human History has left its trace in the dirt - the type and location of pollen grains in core samples in relation to signature layers of volcanic debris tells us about the local environment at the time they were deposited. The most recent 2005 study from cores taken at Lake Pupuke on the North Shore contain a near-complete record of the vegetation in the region for the last 9500 years. Confirming other similar recent studies, it dates a massive deforestation across the isthmus associated with human activity, up to a century before the Rangitoto eruption 700 years ago. Humans had arrived. Prior to the arrival of humans, the entire region was covered in dense and undisturbed kauri/rimu forest, which came to dominate over the last 7000 years as the environment in the region became drier. This forest was full of birds such as moa, kakapo, weka, and brown teal. Throughout this period the ecosystem changed very little, suggesting that the environment was quite stable. At Lake Waiatarua in central Auckland, there was no significant charcoal in core samples covering the last 12000 years, showing that the Auckland region had very few naturally occurring fires, unlike Northland that was drier and had regular infernos throughout this period. Except for the occasional volcanic eruption, that is. I've already mentioned the Rangitoto eruption, which made its presence felt at Lake Pupuke. It affected only a limited area in any substantial way, like most eruptions in the Auckland volcanic field. Eruptions from further south around Rotorua, Taupo, and Taranaki were much larger and of more general threat. The core sample at Lake Pupuke records a substantial change in the environment associated with the last great Taupo eruption 1800 years ago. This eruption was possibly the largest on Earth in the last 5000 years, and appears in both Chinese and Roman records. The forest canopy was seriously damaged, which was reflected in a sharp drop in kauri pollen and an associated rise in kahikatea pollen, which is known to colonise waterlogged sites following disturbance. Earlier than this many other major eruptions left their mark on the Auckland landscape, such as Tuhua (c. 6,100 years ago), Rotoma (c. 8,500 years ago), Okareka (c. 18,000 years ago), Kawakawa (c. 22,500 years ago), and Okaia (c. 23,500 years ago). About 10,000 years ago, the forest in the region was restricted to localised patches in extensive shrubland/grassland. Temperatures may have been 4-5?C colder than now. Even earlier, at the height of the last ice age around 25000 years ago, Auckland was dominated by beech forest. Canopy conifers like today were present, but formed only a minor part of the local forest, which was full of birds such as moa, North Island goose, New Zealand coot, North Island takahe, Finsch's duck, and North Island kokako, as found in Gardner's Gut Cave at Waitomo. In fact, the presence of kokako, saddleback, and robin, and the absence of grassland birds such as pipit and quail suggest that the vegetation about Gardners Gut Cave included tall shrubland and probably not much grassland, even over the peak of the last ice age. Much of the ancestral Auckland ecosystem moved north to survive. - Ice Age The clay that makes up most of the soil in my backyard was originally eroded from a huge ancestral northern land about 2 million years ago, and in progressive waves washed into the Waitamata basin. Looking at local Manukau coastal cliffs today you can see the way the sediment was deposited in layers. It's quite different to the volcanic aggregates further west, or the much younger Waitamata silt and clay down towards New Lynn. The Manukau harbour also began to form when sand was carried down the Waikato river from eruptions in the Taupo and Rotorua region, together with iron sands washed around the coast from Taranaki. Between 15 and 22 million years ago, a huge 50 kilometre-wide and 3 kilometre-high Waitakere volcano grew from the ocean about 20 kilometres west of the current west coast. The modern Waitakere Ranges are the greatly eroded remains of the eastern flanks of this monstrous volcano. A huge subsidence on the south of the great northern land about 22 million years ago created the Waitamata basin and the Auckland region was flooded. 25 million years ago, the ancestral northern land was greatly enlarged as the Pacific plate slid underneath the Australian plate over a period of 5 million years, scraping off the eastern Pacific sea floor in the process. - Gondwanaland About 80 million years ago the Tasman Sea formed as New Zealand drifted away from Australia, and Gondwanaland broke apart, stranding native ancestral species here, such as mosses, ferns, podocarps (ancestral kahiketea/ etc.), tuatara, frogs, ratites (kiwi/moa), weta, peripatus, two species of dinosaur (which soon died out), but no land mammals except bats. This split left New Zealand to evolve its unique ecosystem in isolation. The Auckland area was land during this period, but had eroded away by about 30 million years ago. Ancestral Auckland was thrust from the sea along with the rest of New Zealand 120 million years ago to become a mountainous strip along the coast of Gondwanaland. 250 million years ago Auckland's oldest rocks formed off the coast of Gondwanaland, and although you can't see any in Green Bay, they're the bedrock deep beneath. They're visible on the eastern side of the Auckland region, where they've been exposed through more recent erosion. - Auckland City Libraries Heritage Photograph Collection, Catalogue Numbers 4-7766, 4-7767, 4-7768, 4-7769 Auckland City Libraries Heritage Photograph Collection, Catalogue Number 4-7683 Patricia Carr, Last Waltz For Iconic Venue, Titirangi Tatler 39, 2006. E. M. Blaiklock, Ten Pounds An Acre, A. H. & A. W. Reed, 1965. E. M. Blaiklock, Between The Valley And The Sea, Dunmore Press, 1979. T. Kirk, On the flora of the Isthmus of Auckland and the Takapuna District, Transactions of the New Zealand Institute 3, 1871, pp 148-161. Auckland City Libraries Heritage Map Collection, 1863, Classification C 995.11 bje, NZ Map Number 4178. John T. Diamond, Once The Wilderness, Lodestar Press, 1977. Dick Scott, Fire On The Clay - The Pakeha Comes To West Auckland, Southern Cross Books, Auckland, 1979. Lisa J. Truttman, Heart of the Whau - The Story of the Centre of Avondale 1841 - 2001, Avondale Historical Society Inc., 2001 - 2003. Annette Brown, Lorraine Wilson and Rona Walker, The 1990 Blockhouse Bay Settlers' Handbook, Blockhouse Bay Historical Society, 1990. Bruce and Trixie Harvey, Waitakere Ranges - Nature, History, Culture. The Waitakere Ranges Protection Society Inc., 2006. http://www.library.auckland.ac.nz/subjects/geol/images/hoch2.jpg A. E. Tonson, Old Manukau, Tonson Publishing House, Auckland, 1966. F. D. Fenton, Important Judgements 1866-1879 Delivered in the Compensation Courts and Native Land Courts, Orakei, Auckland, December 22, 1869. William R. Wade, A Journey in the Northern Island of New Zealand, 1842. William White, Important information relative to New Zealand, Sydney, T. Brennard, 1839. T. B. Byrne, Wing of the Manukau, Auckland, 1991. R. C. J. Stone, From Tamaki-Makau-Rau To Auckland, Auckland University Press, 2001. R. Daamen, P. Hamer, B. Rigby, Waitangi Tribunal Rangahaua Whanui Series District 01 - Auckland. B. W. Hayward and J. T. Diamond, Prehistoric Archaeological Sites of the Waitakere Ranges and West Auckland, New Zealand, Auckland Regional Authority, 1978. George Graham, Maori Place Names of Auckland compiled by David Simmons, In David Simmons, Maori Auckland, The Bush Press, Auckland, 1987. J. White, The Ancient History of the Maori, 6 Volumes (Government Printer: Wellington), 1887-1891. J. White, Revenge - A Love Tale of the Mount Eden Tribe, A. H. & A. W. Reed, 1940. Mark Horrocks, Paul Augustinus, Yanbin Deng, Phil Shane, Sofia Andersson, Holocene vegetation, environment, and tephra recorded from Lake Pupuke, Auckland, New Zealand, New Zealand Journal of Geology & Geophysics, 2005, Vol. 48: 85-94. Trevor H. Worthy and Stephen E. J. Swabey, Avifaunal changes revealed in Quaternary deposits Near Waitomo Caves, North Island, New Zealand, Journal of The Royal Society of New Zealand, Volume 32, Number 2, June 2002, pp 293-325. M. Horrocks, Y. Deng, S. L. Nichol, P. A. Shane, and J. Ogden, A palaeoenvironmental record of natural and human change from the Auckland Isthmus, New Zealand, during the late Holocene, Journal of The Royal Society of New Zealand, Volume 32, Number 2, June 2002, pp 337-353. Michael King, The Penguin History of New Zealand, Penguin Books, 2003. Anna Sandiford, Mark Horrocks, Rewi Newnham, John Ogden, and Brent Alloway, Environmental change during the last glacial maximum (c. 25 000-c. 16 500 years BP) at Mt Richmond, Auckland Isthmus, New Zealand, Journal of The Royal Society of New Zealand, Volume 32, Number 1, March 2002, pp 155-167. Ewen Cameron, Bruce Hayward, and Graeme Murdoch, A Field Guide to Auckland, Random House, 1997. - nigel@chimaera.co.nz | 4 August 2007. PLEASE DISTRIBUTE FREELY.