Fools and Dreamers Regenerating a Native Forest

The incredible story of how degraded gorseinfested farmland has been regenerated back into beautiful New Zealand native forest over the course of 30 years Fools Dreamers Regenerating a Native Forest is a 30minute documentary about Hinewai Nature Reserve on New Zealands Banks Peninsula and its kaitiakimanager of 30 years botanist Hugh Wilson When in 1987 Hugh let the local community know of his plans to allow the introduced weed gorse to grow as a nurse canopy to regenerate farmland into native forest people were not only skeptical but outright angry the plan was the sort to be expected only of fools and dreamers Now considered a hero locally and across the country Hugh oversees 1500 hectares resplendent in native forest where birds and other wildlife are abundant and 47 known waterfalls are in permanent flow He has proven without a doubt that nature knows best and that he is no fool