The South Island is where the Pacific and Australian plates collide, and the Southern Alps are what that collision has thrown up: a spine of rock rising fast enough that erosion can barely keep pace. On the west, the mountains catch the roaring forties and receive extraordinary rainfall, feeding temperate rainforest and glaciers that descend nearly to sea level through the trees. On the east lie the dry tussock plains, in the mountains’ rain shadow.
Fiordland, in the southwest, is one of the largest and least-touched wildernesses in the temperate world, a country of sheer-walled sounds and forest that almost no one has ever walked through. It shelters the takahe, a flightless bird declared extinct in 1898 and rediscovered in a remote valley in 1948, and the kea, an alpine parrot of considerable intelligence and no manners.
The organizations here run predator control across enormous, roadless terrain, protect the braided rivers of the eastern plains where wading birds nest on the shingle, and defend the tussock high country against agricultural intensification.
Environmental Organizations in This Bioregion
13 organizations working across this landscape.
Chatham Islands Taiko Trust
The Chatham Islands Taiko Trust will protect and preserve our environment and heritage in a sustainable way and make a lasting impact in our community and beyond.
Forward Whakatipu
Forward Whakatipu helps mountain bikers protect and regenerate the Tāhuna Queenstown area through community education, collaboration, and action.
Mandamus Reserve Charitable Trust
Our mission is to protect, restore and improve the ecosystem and biodiversity of the Mandamus Reserve.
Picton Dawn Chorus Inc.
To restore native biodiversity in Picton through sustained predator control, sanctuary protection, community involvement, and environmental education.
Protect Our Winters (POW) New Zealand
Protect Our Winters Aotearoa connects passionate outdoor enthusiasts and everyone who loves and needs winter to generate positive climate action. We focus on educati...
Sustainable Queenstown Charitable Trust
Sustainable Queenstown exists as a go-to sustainable heart in the Queenstown Lakes which celebrates, activates & educates our community every day.
Te Kākano Aotearoa Trust
Connecting New Zealand communities with their land
The Wild For Nature Charitable Trust
Our goal is to engage the outdoors community, in particular trail and mountain runners, in re-wilding work. Our initial focus is on removing invasive species (espec...
Trees for Canterbury
Helping our community grow through Particpation, Education and Environmental Regeneration
Whakatipu Reforestation Trust
Deafening Dawn Chorus: Our mission is work with our local community to restore native vegetation onto public and private land, so that our native fauna - birds, liza...
Wilding Free Mackenzie
To promote and protect the natural values (recreation, landscape, production, and biodiversity) of the tussock lands of the Mackenzie Region, New Zealand, particular...