On-Stream
It's the middle of winter. It's wet. It's cold! The silver lining is that it's starting to get lighter and temperatures will warm up again soon.
We get a lot of queries from people who want to speak with our liaison specialists about how the Water Plan rules relate to their specific property. They are in demand with schools too, who often come to us looking for advice about what they can do to look after our waterways.
We are also involved with a number of community groups, including various catchment groups throughout Otago.
Catchment groups do some amazing work in their area to raise awareness of the state of local waterways and to give practical advice about how to look after them.
Pomahaka Water Care Group is one such group. ORC has just given $20,000 towards a project they are setting up that will look in detail at the positive effects wetlands can have on water quality.
We're looking forward to working alongside them and helping with water quality testing and monitoring results. We're excited about this project and look forward to sharing more details with you soon.
Stay warm,
The ORC team
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Feature: Better ask Bruce!
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Bruce Monaghan has a wealth of knowledge about how to go about replacing your deemed permit with a Resource Management Act (RMA) water permit.
With over 35 years working at ORC and its predecessor the Otago Catchment Board, there isn't much he doesn't know.
Bruce is spearheading the process by holding meetings with deemed permit holders across Otago, and helping them form water user groups in preparation for applying for water permits. He also fields one-on-one enquiries.
Bruce has some top tips to help you with your water permit application:
- If you're unsure about completing the application yourself, you can meet with a consultant who will discuss how they can support and enhance your application.
- Liaise with statutory bodies (such as iwi, Fish and Game, and Department of Conservation) as early as possible, so you can meet their requirements.
- Keep collecting water data from your take/s.
- Talk with neighbours in your catchment and explore whether you can work together early on to make sure you're thinking along the same lines on water management.
Give Bruce a call if you have any queries about this process, or go to: http://bit.ly/2qZUUcC
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| Updates from your liaison specialists |
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Bruce Monaghan - Central Otago
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If you are applying for a Resource Management Act (RMA) water permit, you need fish and flow data for discussions with the statutory bodies group. This group comprises iwi, DoC, and Fish and Game, who are generally considered affected parties to water permit applications.
A protocol for fish survey data has now been completed. This will provide consistency between the professional groups involved in this work. By the end of the month we will also be able to give you certainty on the number of surveys required per tributary.
As advised previously, we can let you know the flow data for a number of streams or tributaries where there is a flow recorder installed. For other waterways, we can help with modelled flow data.
Fish and flow information provides the basis for discussing and setting suitable residual flow levels to maintain existing in-stream values and/or the natural character of particular waterways. It's a key part of the Environmental Assessment section for replacing your deemed permit.
Go to orc.govt.nz/fishandflowportal or give me a call to find out more.
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I am lucky that I to get to travel around beautiful Otago in my role – predominantly South and Central Otago - and it's been wonderful to see land owners going to great lengths to protect their waterways whilst grazing winter crop.
If this is you, well done and keep up this important work. If you suspect you have room for improvement, take a look around your district and see how others are achieving this, or give me a call and we can talk through some options.
Towards the end of last month I was in Arrowtown and Frankton. We held three consultation sessions with the public to find out community values that will contribute towards setting the Arrow River minimum flow and Wakatipu Basin Aquifer water allocation limit.
More than 80 people attended the three meetings and we got some great feedback for our policy team to work through. We'll keep you updated.
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It's a bit soggy in South and West Otago at the moment, and wintering events with both DairyNZ and Beef + Lamb have had good timing.
It's been great to see national interest in catchment groups, with people wanting to know what makes them tick.
The Pomahaka Water Care Group in conjunction with the NZ Landcare Trust has been working hard to increase awareness of the water quality in the Pomahaka catchment, and an improvement in water quality is starting to show. As they say, it doesn’t happen overnight, but it will happen!
You can read about it here: http://bit.ly/2us6agG
Recently the Pomahaka Water Care Group Chairman Lloyd McCall, NZ Landcare Trust Project Co-ordinator Craig Simpson and I met with some delegates from Waikato and PLUG (Primary Land Users Group) to talk about the work going on in the Pomahaka catchment.
Main topics of interest were how the group got up and running, what projects are happening, and what support there is for these kind of groups. If you are interested in getting a group going in your area please let me know and we can help out.
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It’s wet out there folks! Watch your winter grazing over the next few months - leave a large buffer around waterways and critical source areas, and graze from the top down if possible (ask if you need advice). Don’t be one of the few that ORC has to come and talk to about runoff every winter…
On the flip side, if anyone reckons they are doing a great job please let me know. I’d like to gather a few examples of good winter grazing to help spread the word.
I’d like to gather a few examples of good winter grazing to spread the word and help others see what they could do too.
We're nearing a key milestone with the groundwater and surface water study we are doing in the Kakanui catchment, to review the accuracy of the nitrogen threshold set for the aquifer in the Water Plan.
Last year we asked landowners in the Kakanui catchment to provide OVERSEER information from their property. You should have received a letter about this recently if you were originally contacted a year ago, but if you have any queries about this study please contact me on 0800 474 082.
The next stage will be compiling the information and running models to find out what will be a sustainable nitrogen limit for the Kakanui aquifer. This is a huge job and will take around a year. We'll let you know the results as soon as we have them.
We had to access a number of private properties to install monitoring systems and get water samples that were needed for this study, so thank you to landowners for giving us access onto your land!
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Technology and farming
This North Otago farmer uses technology to add value to on-farm management. If you missed the Waterlines article about how irrigation technology can help make better decisions that will benefit both farming and the environment, read it on pages 10 & 11: http://bit.ly/2tUMXUO |
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Taking to the skies
We recently did our annual winter flyover to look at winter cropping practices, forestry harvesting, and wetlands. Fish & Game came along for the flight and it was great to see so many people are exercising good practice. Keep it up! |
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Residual Flows
A residual flow is the amount of water that must be left in a river at the point where water is taken. Have a look at this video that explains an upcoming Water Plan change that will fix issues with the existing policy: https://youtu.be/vX6HOz-qtoU |
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What's coming up?
- Wallaby meeting, 25 July, Duntroon town hall, 11 a.m. - 1 p.m.
Identify, report, and destroy. Come along to learn how to spot signs of wallabies, and what to do if you see any.
- Residual flow community discussion sessions:
Friday 4 August - Tapanui (West Otago Community Centre), 2:00 p.m.
Monday 7 August - Roxburgh (Roxburgh Memorial Hall), 10:00 a.m.
Monday 7 August - Wanaka (St John rooms), 3:30 p.m.
Tuesday 8 August - Omakau (Matakanui Rugby Club), 10:00 a.m.
Tuesday 8 August - Ranfurly (Maniototo Rugby Club), 2:00 p.m.
Wednesday 9 August - Middlemarch (Strath-Taieri Community Centre), 10:00 a.m.
Wednesday 9 August - Outram (West Taieri Memorial Hall), 2:00 p.m.
Thursday 10 August - Maheno (Maheno Hall), 2:00 p.m. |
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| If you missed the winter issue of ORC's newsletter 'Waterlines' you can check it out here: http://bit.ly/2tUMXUO. |
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| If you know someone who should subscribe to On-Stream, forward this email to them and suggest they email us at water@orc.govt.nz to subscribe. |
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| Make sure you like the 'Good Water in Otago - ORC' Facebook page - click the Facebook link below. |
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