Te Kākano Aotearoa Trust

01/10/2026

🌿 Mental Health Awareness Month 🌿

Today, 1 October, marks the beginning of Mental Health Awareness Month.

There are loads of free events happening around the Wanaka area throughout the month, offering opportunities to connect, learn, get involved and look after your wellbeing.

At Te Kākano, our nursery sessions are a great way to get outside, meet people and get your hands in the dirt! 🌱

🌱 Nursery Sessions
📅 Tuesdays & Wednesdays
⏰ 9am–12pm
📍 Te Kākano Nursery

Everyone is welcome — no experience needed! Come along for a cuppa, a chat and some good old-fashioned nursery mahi. ☕🌿

Sometimes, connecting with people and nature is just what we need. 💚

Directions:
From Waterfall Creek
From the Wānaka-Mt Aspiring Rd, turn right onto Ruby Island Rd. Park at the lower Waterfall Creek car park by the lakeside track then head back towards Wānaka along Roys Bay West via the Glendhu Bay Track. At the far end of the QEII covenant kānuka area, go over the stile (just before the vineyard starts) and follow signs up to the nursery. The nursery will be on your right, through the gates.

By Bike/Foot – along the Glendhu Bay/Roys Bay Track from Wānaka
From Wānaka, bike or walk along Roys Bay West via the Glendhu Bay Track. After passing Edgewater Hotel and Rippon vineyard on the left, go over the stile and follow signs up to the nursery.

27/09/2026

What a windy afternoon for our planting session at Domini Park on Saturday! 🌿💨

A huge thank you to the 13 volunteers who came along and helped plant, guard and mulch over 200 native plants in just one hour — now that’s fast! 🙌

An extra massive thank you to the volunteers who arrived a couple of hours earlier to help prepare the site with augering, putting together plant guards and placing the plants. We couldn’t have done it without you!

Our lovely, delicious afternoon tea was generously sponsored by Nik Woolford from Natured Living. Nik is a garden consultant, garden designer and garden coach, and she also designs and makes the most amazing native plant tea towels. 🌱

Nik donates a percentage of her tea towel sales to Te Kākano, so thank you so much, Nik, for your ongoing support. She has also kindly donated some of these beautiful tea towels for us to use at the nursery — and with Christmas just around the corner, they make fantastic gifts! 🎁

Once again, a big thank you to Watertight Systems for lending us their truck and trailer, and of course to Venus Coffee for keeping us fuelled! ☕️

Nik Woolford

Watertight Systems

24/09/2026

It was a hard day of mulching at our Peninsula Bay planting site, and we’re so grateful to everyone who came along, got stuck in, and helped get the job done. 🌿

We also absolutely love the new sign! A big thank you to QLDC!

21/09/2026

🌿 CALLING ALL LOCAL CAFÉS & BUSINESSES! 🌿

We’re putting out a special call to our wonderful local cafés and businesses to see if anyone would like to sponsor the afternoon tea for our upcoming community planting day this Saturday at Domini Park. ☕🍰

Location: Domini Park, Wānaka
📅 Date: Saturday 26 September
🕜 Time: 1.30pm – 3.30pm

This will be our second-to-last community planting day of the season, and what a season it has been! Over the past five months, we’ve been incredibly lucky to have so many amazing local businesses and supporters get behind our planting days. 💚

This Saturday, we’re planning to put around 200 native plants into the ground at Domini Park, with our awesome volunteers helping to restore and enhance this special local space. 🌱🌿

If your café or business would like to contribute afternoon tea for our hardworking volunteers, we’d love to hear from you! It’s a wonderful way to support local conservation, community connection and native habitat restoration.

🌱 About Te Kākano Aotearoa Trust
Te Kākano Aotearoa Trust is a Wānaka non-profit organisation that eco-sources seeds from the Upper Clutha area, raises seedlings in our extensive nursery, and facilitates community-based native planting and habitat restoration.

We foster community engagement through plant propagation, planting, maintenance, education and ongoing participation — bringing people together to care for our local environment.

If you’d like to support our afternoon tea this Saturday, please get in touch with us. Every contribution makes a difference! 💚

A huge thank you to all the local businesses who have supported us throughout this planting season — we couldn’t do it without you! 🌿💚
We would love to hear from you!

[email protected]

17/09/2026

Our Education Team have been busy once again! 🌿

Our Harakeke plant guard workshop was held at Wānaka Library, and it was fantastic to see so many members of the community coming along to learn the art of weaving Harakeke plant guards.

Our next workshop will be held at Queenstown Library on 22 October at 5.30pm. We’d love to see you there!

The wonderful students at Hāwea Flat School have also been busy working on their weaving techniques in preparation for their upcoming school production. It’s fantastic to see the younger generation getting involved, learning new skills and doing such a great job with this project. 💚

16/09/2026

🌿 The Days of Te Wiki o te Reo Māori 2026 – 14–20 September 🌿

Each day of Te Wiki o te Reo Māori 2026 has a theme to guide the week, highlighting the many ways te reo Māori belongs in our everyday lives — at home, at work, and in our communities.

These themes are designed to help you plan activities, spark ideas, and bring more te reo Māori into your daily life.

Use them to guide and inspire how you bring your Te Reo Town to life! 🌱

For more information and ideas, visit reomaori.co.nz.

📚 Looking for a great book to read?
Treasures of Tāne is a fantastic way to learn more about our native plants and their te reo Māori names — a great resource for anyone keen to connect with the plants growing around us. 🌿

https://huia.co.nz/products/treasures-of-tane-plants-of-ngai-tahu?srsltid=AU7gw4VsuaqKNLKBecZKsL9MZQohr0-AiPibycyCu2mG1MbHAcosl-Mm

14/09/2026

Another fantastic planting day at Waimana Point! 🌿

Such a great effort from our 22 wonderful volunteers, who planted an incredible 260 native plants! 🌱

We were lucky to have the sunshine out and were nicely sheltered from the north-west wind, making for a beautiful afternoon of mahi.

A big thank you to Watertight Systems for lending us their truck and trailer, it makes such a difference on planting days!

And, of course, we can’t forget the all-important afternoon tea! 😋 Huge thanks to Big Fig for the delicious treats, and a special shout-out to Chrissy from Wānaka Creative Wellbeing, who generously donated a New World voucher for Kris to put towards her scrumptious baking. And, as always, Venus Coffee Roasters kept us fuelled with great coffee! ☕️

Thanks to everyone who came along and helped make the day such a success. 💚🌱

11/09/2026

Just in case you have not seen this yet. It’s worth a view!

How to plant a native tree with Te Kākano in native restoration pla...