A visit to the Chatham Islands – An interview with Ken Laing

Ken Laing found visiting the Chatham Islands so interesting that he has just been on a second trip there. He is particularly interested in the islands of the Pacific and has visited a number of them. This time he has gone about 860 km (537 miles) east of Christchurch to islands which are 45 minutes ahead of New Zealand time. They are justified in saying that theirs is the first inhabited place in the world to greet the new day. They were the first to greet the new Millennium.

These islands are part of New Zealand. If you live in New Zealand this fact is reinforced by having the weather forecast for the Chathams at the end of the radio forecasts. The population is around 640 people, most are employed in the main industries – farming and fishing. The County Council administers the islands, and the Chatham Islands Enterprise Trust, established in 1991, runs the airport, wharf, power supply and other utilities.

The islands were formed by volcanic upthrust. Chatham Island, the largest of the island group, is mainly flat with some small peaks in the northwest. There are a large number of lakes, the largest being Te Whanga Lagoon. Its area is 20,000 hectares which is about one fifth of the area of Chatham Island.
Pitt Island is large enough to be farmed and there are a number of small islands, some of which are mutton birding islands, and some home to endangered bird species. South East Island is a Nature Reserve where the rare black robin is found – some 150 of them.

History The Moriori were the first inhabitants of the Chathams. They are estimated to have arrived there about a thousand years ago, perhaps in drifting canoes from New Zealand. They called the islands Rehoku (Misty Sun). They remained isolated for 800 years, and developed a lifestyle which enabled them to survive in the harsh conditions. They were a peace loving people whose culture forbade warfare, killing and cannibalism.

In 1791 Lieutenant William Robert Broughton. captain of HM Brig Chatham, from which the island gets its name, was the first European to visit the islands. He took possession of the islands in the name of King George III and raised the British flag. Fighting began between Broughton’s crew and some locals and a Moriori was killed. A memorial at Skirmish Bay near Kaingaroa marks the place where this occurred.

The film Feathers of Peace tells the story of this skirmish and of the subsequent fate of the Moriori.

From 1793 European and American sealers and whalers began to arrive, and those who settled related peacefully to the Moriori.

The nine hundred Maori who arrived in 1835 did not come with peaceful intent. They came to take over from the Moriori by fighting. They occupied the land and the New Zealand Government allocated only some rather unproductive land to the Moriori. The last full-blooded Moriori, Tommy Solomon, died in 1933.

For Ken, who is a keen amateur historian, part of the interest of the trip to the Islands was the opportunity to study again the history of the area.

The group trip to Chatham Island The activities for the group which Ken joined were all on Chatham Island.

Day 1 The flight from Christchurch to the Chatham Islands with Air Chathams took about two hours in a Corsair which could take about forty passengers. In the tour group there were sixteen people, plus the leader.

Ken was pleased with the accommodation. “Chatham Lodge in the Henga Reserve is comfortable and all meals were provided including a cut lunch for the trips.”

The day was fine so to become oriented the group was directed to a walk in the reserve. The reserve, like others on the island, is privately owned and fenced to keep out stock. The result is that the bush is regenerating. The one and a half hour walk is a round trip walk through the bush on the reserve to the sandhills, along the beach, up a bluff and back through the bush to the Lodge. The dominant species in the bush is the karaka, but there is also mahoe (whiteywood).

Day 2 After rain in the night the morning dawned bright and clear. The party went by bus to Blind Jim’s Creek by Cattle Point. Jim had jumped off a boat which had been wrecked and worked for the local landowner who persuaded him that his poor sight would be improved by a cataract operation in Waitangi. That was not how it turned out and Jim became blind, but was still able to work.

Ken enjoyed the trip. "The attraction for going to that area is that on the beach it is possible to find fossilised sharks’ teeth which get washed up on the beach of the lagoon. There is of course no tide in the lagoon, but the wind determines whether the sand builds up on one shore or the other.

"We continued in the bus along the north coast to Kaingaroa, a fishing port in the north-east corner. We stopped on the way to see what is called the Chatham cranberry. It’s actually a Chilean guava and while it is spreading uncontrolled all over the island people don’t want it destroyed because they like to pick the fruit," Ken explained.

"At Kaingaroa the fishermen were bringing in their crayfish pots as it was time for the two month closed season for the crayfishing.

"We wandered out on the rocks and saw a great variety of plants, but the most interesting was the button daisy which is not now found anywhere else on the island.

Chatham Island is home to a lot of endangered plants and birds. We also saw the Chatham Island forget-me-not which grows on the sand dunes around the island. It has become a favourite New Zealand garden plant.

"From there on a good day you can see Pitt Island. Although it was fine we did not see it this time, but on my last trip I was able to see it.

"On the last trip we went even further towards the point to see the ruins of the first house of the German missionaries. After they left it served as a useful home for an English settler who finally also moved to another area.
On my first visit it was a wreck, but now difficulties in negotiating the road and the ruined state of the house mean that it is no longer included in the trip.

"The missionaries did not make any converts to Christianity, but one in particular spent his life there and another with a huge family made quite an impact on the place. They were tradesmen rather than evangelists and did a lot of building and helped the locals with farming and building techniques.

"Anyone who is interested in the story of the German mission should read the book “Hell and High Water” by Sheila Natusch."

From Kaingaroa the group went to Hapupu Reserve, land owned by the Barker family since the end of the nineteenth century. To enter any of the reserves, which are privately owned, it is necessary to get permission. Hapupu is the area where you can view dendroglyphs – trees with ancient carvings. It is near the former airport, which is now a golf course.

Day 3 This day was clear and sunny, but a haze came over – the sort of weather that made the Moriori name the Chathams Rehoku – misty sun.
The group went to Waitangi, the main settlement on the island, stopping on the way at the Department of Conservation nursery where staff are trying to propagate plants of endangered species for replanting in the appropriate areas.

They passed through the little township of Te One. At a time when the European settlers felt threatened by the Maori they moved to Te One, and that is the site of the school and the church today. There are residential properties but no commercial premises there.

“What I found most interesting in Waitangi was the museum.” said Ken. “I was interested in the little boats used by the Moriori. Presumably they arrived in the Chathams in large canoes, but the local wood was unsuitable for boat building. Instead they made small craft from koradi, the stalks of the flowering flax. They are light and have a lot of air in them. Some of the bigger boats were said to have air balloons made of kelp. When the German missionaries came they taught the natives to build boats, which was a real boon.”

From there they went to the south-east corner of the island to Owenga where there is another church with burial grounds. In the crayfishing days this was a boom settlement, but the crayfish were cleaned out by overfishing. Also of interest in the area is a basaltic column by the sea near Owenga.

From Owenga they went towards Manukau Point which was Moriori land belonging to the Solomon family. It is no longer possible to visit the site of their house because of a problem they had with tourists. Next to that area is a statue of Tommy Solomon, the last full-blooded Moriori.

Next came a visit to see Mr Smith, the Mayor of the Islands, who lives west of the Te Wanga Lagoon. Between the lake and the lagoon which serve as boundaries for his farm he has a large area set aside as a bush reserve. He took the group for a long bush walk through his property. He is regenerating mahoe, karaka (called kopi in the Chathams), ribbonwood, matipo, karamu, nikau palms, lancewoods, and kowhai. Less welcome was a large leafed type of stinging nettle. Kowhai are rare on Chatham Island, and Mr Smith said that they were found only near the shore, because the seeds must have floated there from New Zealand. The kopi were taken there from the mainland, probably by the Moriori who also introduced the cabbage tree.

Day 4 The day began overcast, but then it became beautifully sunny. Ken described the day’s activities. "We went on a round trip from the Lodge and at the top of the bluff in the Henga Reserve I noticed jagged limestone formations strongly resembling the coral found in the Pacific islands They reminded me of the stones around Melanesian settlements. There each family had its own stone and at tribal meetings the men would stand in front of their family’s stone – a ritual similar to that used in the Kava ceremonies in Fiji. There is no clear evidence that the Moriori had such a practice.

"From there we went back towards Waitangi and visited the cemetery at Te One where many of the early settlers are buried. Here I saw the tomb of Engst, a German missionary who lived there until he was eighty – a tough character, but much revered.

"Heading southwest down the coast we visited the home of the Tuanui family, an interesting house built in 1884 of kauri and teak gathered from wrecked ships. There were eleven children and about five of them settled on the southwest coast. Vi Tuanui is an energetic and enterprising person. She does a lot of catering and provided the group with a sumptuous lunch served in the garden. She had also organised a group of Golden Oldies from the Chathams to visit New Zealand and was their tour guide. Her husband is a lay reader for the Roman Catholic church.

"Some 10 km further on we visited Davy Crockett – a New Zealander who works for the Forest and Bird Society. David Crockett is best known for his work in saving the rare taiko/magenta petrel. He believed that it was not extinct but if it had survived it would be in the Tuku River valley. Accompanied by volunteers he searched for some years and finally found one bird in 1978. A few more were discovered and finally using radio transmitters they found some burrows, but also evidence of predators. With trapping and poisoning of predators the number of birds has increased."

The taiko in 2002 The latest news from the Department of Conservation is that all seven of the Chatham Islands’ record 2002 crop of rare taiko chicks have fledged. The last of the chicks has now left their Chatham Islands breeding ground. Before they left they were all banded, bled for a DNA relationship study, and fitted with small transmitters so their first flight out to sea could be monitored. The taiko only return to land to breed in burrows.

DoC staff have given this year’s chicks intensive care because some estimates of the world population of the taiko are as low as 100 birds. They took turns to sleep outside a burrow for six chilly nights to feed one chick and three chicks had to be carried to the coast to be released because they had difficulty trying to fly from their burrows. Programme manager Mike Ogle said from the Chathams that the “huge” effort to protect the birds included five months of rodent control covering more than 20 hectares, and walking between 10-16km a day to check trap lines over nine months. 160 wild cats have been removed from the breeding area during the last two years.

“It was a fantastic sight seeing these cuddly little chicks who have come out of holes in the ground undergo this amazing transformation and fly confidently off into the sunset,” he said. “You don’t realise how big their wing span is until you see them fly.”

In answer to my question about the word ‘magenta’, Ken explained, " The name does not describe the colour of the bird.

"tour party went as far as Tuku Reserve. The forest in the Reserve was fairly dense. We saw a pair of wood pigeons. These are somewhat rare on the Chathams, and are larger than the New Zealand wood pigeons, and less colourful."

Day 5 This was another perfect day, the third with a hot sunny afternoon. The group went to the other end of the lake where the hotelkeeper from Waitangi has a house and farm and allows people to look around if they give a donation. Then they went north from the Lodge to look at the basaltic columns at Ohira Bay.

At Port Hutt they met a man who had been on the same plane to the Islands. He and his family were working on their crayfish pots. Each year they bring them in, mend them and put on a plate of zinc to prevent rusting. This plate has to be replaced each year.

They walked along stretches of sand at Maunganui Beach in the nor’west corner to see the second house of the German missionaries. It was built of stone and plaster and has been well-preserved. The dramatic Maunganui bluff is beside the house.

Day 6 As it was Sunday the bus took those who were interested to the church service at Te One, while the others went fishing. The service was conducted by an Anglican priest, Riwai Preece, of Moriori descent. He was formerly a New Zealand jockey, but trained to become a priest to serve the needs of the islanders. One of the visiting group played the harmonium. Morning tea was served to the group – paua fritters and other delicacies.

After lunch on the wharf they went back to an area on the shore of the lagoon near Mr Smith’s house where they were able to see the petroglyphs, rock carvings done by the Moriori.

Day 7 This day had been kept for any activities cancelled earlier in the week because of bad weather, but the programme had run as planned so this was termed a ‘Bits and Pieces Day’. The wind was cold but there was no significant rain so the group went to the Norman Kirk Reserve and then through Waitangi
to Owenga to see a woolshed built by Cox and Shand in 1870 on the Preece farm.

Then they went further north to a patch of regenerating nikau, kopi and lancewood trees.

Departure day The following day the group flew back to Christchurch, well satisfied by the programme, the meals, the hospitality and the land.

All the photos were provided by Ken Laing