Japanese Honeysuckle is beautiful and sweet-smelling, but deadly to native bush- community group Friends of the Tarawera Trail is trying to stop it in its tracks.
Japanese honeysuckle is threatening flora and fauna along the Tarawera Trail.
So much so that Rachel Howells started Friends of the Tarawera Trail, a group of locals on a mission to eradicate the vine, which, in parts of the trail, has grown larger than some trees.
“Some of the trees are totally covered in the honeysuckle, so you can’t actually see the tree a lot of the time. Maybe there’s a couple of stems, sticking up, with some leaves, but not much,” Howells said.
Although beautiful and sweet-smelling, the evergreen honeysuckle is unrelenting in its growth, strangling its hosts and limiting food sources for birds and insects.
While the vine is currently only found in one part of the 15-kilometre trail, Howells said it was moving further into the native bush.
“It’s only going in one direction and it’s going further down the trail and further down into the native ecosystem. Unless we stop it, it’s just going to keep going,” she said.
“It currently covers maybe two kilometres of the trail ... but it’s moving slowly over time.”
There’s no clear source of the weeds’ introduction, but Howells has a theory it may have jumped the fence from neighbouring holiday homes.
“Here specifically we have people’s houses and gardens quite close to native bush. So the chances of a plant jumping the fence into the native bush becomes higher.”
Japanese honeysuckle is recognised by Bay of Plenty Regional Council as a weed, but its “advisory” status means it is up to landowners to manage it - if they want.
An advisory weed is described as being established within the region and known to negatively impact the environment.
In an attempt to reduce the spread, the regional council released the Honshu Butterfly into the area as a biocontrol method in 2020. Its caterpillars are known to thrive off the plant.
Shane Hona, biosecurity officer for Bay of Plenty Regional Council, said it hadn’t yet confirmed the agent had become established at the site.
“The moth population may still take off in future and have an impact on the honeysuckle,” he said.
The regional council is also monitoring the progress of other agents across the region, as well as funding ongoing research and working with the biocontrol experts at Manaaki Whenua - Landcare Research.
For Howells and the Friends of the Tarawera Trail, the work has only just begun and she wants people to think about how they look at nature.
“We have a huge movement for 2050, predator-free, but we don’t talk about weeds so much,” she said.
“If you want to get involved, first thing to do is have a look in the garden - especially if you border native bush - and see whether some of your garden plants head into the bush.
