Yarrs Flat Wildlife Reserve

The Yarrs Flat Wildlife Reserve,[1] also known as the Ararira Wetland, is a government purpose reserve on Lake Ellesmere / Te Waihora in Canterbury, New Zealand. It is jointly managed by the New Zealand Department of Conservation and the Te Rūnanga o Ngāi Tahu. During the 1980s, Yarrs Flat had some of the highest bird diversity in New Zealand, with seventy-five different species of birds observable in its 286 hectares (1.10 sq mi) area. As of the early twenty-first century, the flat provides a habitat for many native species of New Zealand, such as the Australasian bittern, curlew sandpiper, and red-necked stint. Today, it is an important nesting site for Australasian bitterns and is one of the few remaining areas of freshwater swamplands around Lake Ellesmere / Te Waihora. During the twentieth century, it was used as a pasture for dairy cows. This, combined with slash-and-burn agricultural techniques and the introduction of non-native or invasive species, caused extensive damage to native vegetation. The high salt content in the soil, and the marshy land making some areas inaccessible to cattle, helped to preserve many species of plants when compared to the rest of Lake Ellesmere / Te Waihora. Cattle grazing was stopped in 2010, and a variety of projects were initiated to help the area recover its biodiversity. These have involved re-planting damaged area, weed-killing program

NatureReserve data from Wikidata (CC0). Summary from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA).