The Catlins

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Location of the Catlins on the South Island

The Catlins (sometimes also The Catlins Coast ) is an area in the southeast of the South Island of New Zealand between Balclutha and Invercargill . It grazes the border between the Otago and Southland regions and also includes the southernmost point of the South Island, Slope Point .

The Catlins are a rugged, very sparsely populated area that has picturesque coastal scenery and dense temperate rainforest . Numerous threatened bird species live in both. The exposed location of the Catlins often leads to rough weather and strong surf, which attracts surfers.

Ecotourism is becoming increasingly important to the Catlins economy. The other major industries are dairy farming and fishing. The whaling and logging industries that used to be in the region and coastal shipping are no longer important. The entire region is only inhabited by about 1200 people, many of whom live in the Owaka settlement . The majority are smaller settlements such as Lochindorb .

geography

The area of ​​the Catlins covers a little over 1900 km² and extends about 50 km inland along an approximately 90 km long coastline. The confluence of two major rivers, the Clutha River in the northeast and the Mataura River in the west, mark the boundaries of the Catlins on the coast. To the north and northwest, the rugged, bush-covered hills give way to rolling pastureland formed by the tributaries of these two rivers, such as the Pomahaka River .

Map of the Catlins

The Catlins coast is rugged, but it also has sandy beaches, blowholes such as Jack's Blowhole , a petrified forest in Curio Bay and coastal caves such as Cathedral Caves . However, a large part of the coastline consists of high cliffs that rise more than 150 m in several places. In most places the land rises steeply from the sea. Therefore, many of the rivers flow into the sea as waterfalls. The Purakaunui Falls of the Purakaunui River are particularly well known .

The southernmost point of the South Island, Slope Point, is located near the southwest corner of the Catlins. To the west is Waipapa Point , which is often viewed as the limit of the Catlins. The swampy land around the mouth of the Mataura River at the eastern end of Toetoes Bay connects to it. Other sources draw the line of the Catlins elsewhere, with some restrictive definitions even excluding slope point.

Several parallel ranges of hills dominate the interior. They are separated by the valleys of the Owaka , Catlins, and Tahakopa Rivers , all of which flow southeast into the Pacific . The most important of these chains is the Maclennan Range . The hills in between are often referred to simply as the Catlins Ranges . Their northwest slopes drain into several tributaries of the Clutha and Mataura Rivers, the most important of which is the Mokoreta River . Most of these rivers run west and reach the Mataura near Wyndham .

The Purakaunui Falls

The highest point of the Catlins, the only 720 m high Mount Pye , is located 25 km north-northeast of Waikawa near the source of the Mokoreta River. It is a point on the border between the Otago and Southland regions . Other elevations over 600m include Mount Rosebery, Catlins Cone, Mount Tautuku, and Ajax Hill.

The Catlins have several smaller lakes, the most famous being Lake Wilkie near the Tautuku Peninsula . Catlins Lake near Owaka is actually the mouth of the Catlins River.

The shipping off the Catlins was notorious for its dangers, many shipwrecks took place on the capes protruding into the sea here. Two lighthouses at the opposite ends of the Catlins were therefore built. The lighthouse of Nugget Point is located 76 m above sea level at the end of Nugget Point , it casts its light over a series of eroded pinnacles, the "nuggets", from which the cape owes its name. It was built in 1869/70. The lighthouse of Waipapa Point is only 21 m above sea level and was the last wooden lighthouse in New Zealand in 1884. It was created in response to the shipwreck of the Tararua in 1881. Both lighthouses are now automated.

Because of its location on the southern tip of New Zealand, the coast of the Catlins is particularly exposed to the swell , which here is often over 45 m. Big wave surfing is starting to become a tourist attraction. There are regular competitions, the eleven-meter-high wave, mastered by Dunedin-born surfer Doug Young in 2003, made the place famous.

climate

The Catlins have a cool, temperate maritime climate , temperatures are slightly lower than in other parts of the South Island. The climate is largely determined by the influence of the Pacific. The winds can reach considerable strength, especially on the exposed coast. Most of the storms in the South Island develop in the south or southwest of the island and so the Catlins are hardest hit by these weather patterns.

The rainfall in the Catlins - especially the central and southern parts - is significantly higher than on most of the east coast of the South Island. Heavy rains rarely occur, but drizzle is common and 200 rainy days a year are not unusual. Rainy days are fairly evenly distributed over the year. In the northern Catlins there is no particularly rainy season, in the southwest there is a tendency for a little more rainfall in autumn. The mean annual precipitation at the measuring point at the Tautuku Outdoor Education Center is around 1300 mm with a low annual fluctuation range.

In the high summer months of January and February, the daily maximum temperature can exceed 30 ° C. Usually, however, summer temperatures are between 18 and 20 ° C. Except for the summit regions, snow is rare even in the coldest part of winter, although there are regular frosts in June to September. In winter, the maximum daily temperatures are usually ten to 13 ° C.

history

The first known residents of the Catlins were Māori of the Iwi Kāti Māmoe , Waitaha and Kāi Tahu , who united through marriage and conquest to what is now Iwi Kāi Tahu. Archaeologists date the first signs of man's presence around the year 1000. The inhabitants were semi-nomads and traveled from Stewart Island in the south inland to Central Otago . They mostly lived near the estuaries for easy access to food sources. Legend has it that the forests of the inland Catlins were inhabited by maeroero (wild giants).

The Catlins were one of the last places to hunt the moa, and the trees of the forest proved well suited for building canoes. The name of the settlement Owaka means "place of the canoe". No Māori Pā (fortified villages) were found in the Catlins , but there were many hunting camps, especially at Papatowai near the mouth of the Tahakopa River .

The Tautuku Peninsula is home to an early whaling station

The Europeans discovered the area in 1770 when James Cook with the Endeavor drove along the coast. Cook named a bay in the Catlins after his ship's sailing master , Robert Molineux, Molineux's Harbor . Although this bay was almost certainly the mouth of the Waikawa River , later visitors carried the name to a bay further east, near the mouth of the Clutha River , known for many years as the Molyneux River .

Seafarers and whalers established the first European settlements in the early 19th century. At the time, marine mammal hunting dominated New Zealand's economic activity. A whaling station was established in 1839 on the Tautuku Peninsula , smaller stations in Waikawa and near the mouth of the Clutha River.

The Catlins got their name from the Catlins River, which in turn was named after Captain Edward Cattlin (sometimes Catlin ), a whaler who was sold on February 15, 1840 by the chief of the Kāi Tahu Hone Tuhawaiki for muskets and £ 30 (the equivalent of about NZ $ 3000 in 2005 ) bought a large piece of land along the river. New Zealand's land commissioners refused to approve the purchase, and the Māori were given back much of the land after long negotiations that ended over a decade after Cattlin's death.

In the mid-19th century sawmills developed in the area and much of the wood was shipped north to the developing city of Dunedin via the ports of Waikawa and Fortrose . A 60 m long pier was built in Fortrose in 1875, but it has not been preserved.

The Nugget Point lighthouse built in 1870

Several shipwrecks occurred on the coastline during this time. The most important was that of the passenger steamer Tararua , which was en route from Bluff to Port Chalmers and ran aground on April 29, 1881 at Waipapa Point . Of the 151 people on board, 131 were killed.

Another well-known shipwreck, the Surat , occurred on January 1, 1874. This ship struck the rocks near Chasland's Mistake , eight kilometers southeast of the Tautuku Peninsula , dragged itself to the mouth of the Catlins River before the 271 immigrants on board were forced to abandon the ship. A beach at the mouth of the river is called Surat Bay to commemorate this event . The schooner Wallace and the steamship Otago also sank near Chasland's Mistake in 1866 and 1876 , and the 4600-ton steamer Manuka ran aground at Long Point north of Tautuku in 1929.

Between the Great Depression and the New Zealand Rabbit Board's founding in 1954, introduced rabbits became a plague in the area. Rabbit traps were hired to decimate the animals. Trapping and selling the skins in Dunedin became a smaller, but not insignificant, part of the Catlin's economy during this period.

After a decline in the 1890s, the fall of native tree species spread into new areas, which were now accessible through an expansion of the railway network until it slowly expired in the middle of the 20th century. One factor behind the decline was a series of forest fires that destroyed several sawmills in the area in 1935. Much of the remaining forest is now under the protection of the Department of Conservation as Catlins Forest Park .

nature

fauna

New Zealand sea lions on the Catlins coast

The Catlins coast is home to New Zealand fur seals and New Zealand sea lions , and southern elephant seals are occasionally seen. Several species of penguins , in particular the rare yellow-eyed penguin ( Hoiho ), albatrosses of the genus Thalassarche and Australian boobies live here. The estuaries are home to herons , stilt walkers , snipe and oyster fishermen . Australian bitterns and the endangered fern leaven ( Bowdleria punctata ) are occasionally found on reed-covered river banks.

Endangered bird species such as yellow-headed ( Mohoua ochrocephala ), kakariki tui , fan tails and Maori fruit pigeons live in the forests . One of the only two land mammal species native to New Zealand, the long-tailed bat , lives in small numbers in the forests. Several species of lizards, including the Aotearoa gray geckos, are found locally.

Many species of fish, clams, and crustaceans are found in the rivers and the ocean, including crabs and paua . Nugget Point in the northern Catlins is home to particularly rich marine life. The planned establishment of a marine reserve off this coast turned out to be controversial. Hector's Dolphins can often be seen just offshore, especially in Porpoise Bay near Waikawa.

Wooded areas are shown in dark green in this satellite photo of the Catlins.

flora

The Catlins have dense temperate rainforests , which are dominated by stone vines . This covers about 600 km² of the Catlins. The dense forest consists of trees such as Rimu , Totara , Southern Beech , Mataī and Kahikatea . Significant are the pristine remnants of the Rimu and Totara Forest in areas that were too rugged or too steep for the early settlers to log, and the extensive southern beech forests on the Takahopa River. These are the southern limit of distribution of the southern beech forest. Many other native forest plants can be found in the forest undergrowth, including young specimens of the lancewood ( Pseudopanax crassifolius ), orchids of the genera Corybas and Earina and native ferns .

The European settlers destroyed a large part of the coastal vegetation of the Catlins in the course of land reclamation, only in a few places, mainly on cliffs and in some bays near the Tautuku Peninsula, remnants of the original vegetation remained. The flora includes many native species that are adapted to the salinization and strong winds of these exposed locations. The aster family Celmisia lindsayii is endemic to the region, it is related to the species of the genus Celmisia found in the mountains of New Zealand . In Horsten growing grass species Tussock called lifting and New Zealand flax , as well as local gentian species are common. The sour grass family Pingao ( Desmoschoenus spiralis ), which is threatened with extinction, is rarely found. In years when the rātā produces many flowers, the crowns of the coastal forest turn bright red. Rātā also thrives in some further inland locations.

A petrified tree in Curio Bay

In Curio Bay there are fossilized remains of a 160 million year old forest. It is the remnant of a subtropical forest that once covered the region and later sank into the sea. The fossils of the trees are closely related to today's kauri and room firs .

Demographics

The Catlins are very sparsely populated. The whole area only has a little over 1200 inhabitants. These live almost exclusively either along the route of the former State Highway from Balclutha to Invercargill or in tiny coastal settlements with mostly only a few dozen inhabitants.

The largest town in the region, Owaka, has about 400 inhabitants. Various sources give population numbers from 200 to 500, which is due to the blurred boundaries of the settlement and seasonal fluctuations. The information from the 2001 census on the number of permanent residents indicated 366. The only other slightly larger settlements are Kaka Point (150 inhabitants), Waikawa , Tokanui and Fortrose. Most of the other settlements are either small farming communities, such as Romahapa , Maclennan and Glenomaru, or temporarily inhabited holiday resorts with few permanent residents.

An outdoor education center operated by the Otago Youth Adventure Trust is located in Tautuku, halfway between Owaka and Waikawa.

The population decreased from around 2700 in 1926 to its present value. At that time, the settlement of Tahakopa - today with less than 100 inhabitants - was almost comparable in size to Owaka. At that time Tahakiopa had 461 inhabitants, Owaka 557. The decline only came to a standstill at the end of the 20th century, so that the figures for 2008 are similar to those of 1986.

Before his death in 2008, the poet Hone Tuwhare was the most famous resident of Catlin. Tuwhare lived in Kaka Point for many years and many of his poems are related to the Catlins.

The population is predominantly of European descent, 94.2% of the population of Owaka counted themselves to the ethnic group of Europeans in the 2001 census. This compares with 93.7% of residents of European descent in the Otago region and 80.1% in New Zealand. The median income in the 2001 census was significantly lower than in most areas of New Zealand, on the other hand the unemployment rate was low at 3.2% compared to 7.5% nationally.

traffic

The Southern Scenic Route through the Catlins connects Fiordland and Dunedin . Here it forms an alternative route to State Highway 1 (SH 1) running from northeast to southwest . This grazes the Catlins in the northeast. This section of the Southern Scenic Route - formerly State Highway 92 - is no longer listed as an expressway. It winds through most of the area's small settlements and wasn't fully fortified until the late 1990s. A section of about 15 km southwest of Tautuku was a gravel road until then. The settlements of Romahapa , Owaka , Maclennan , Tokanui and Fortrose are on this route. A coastal road also runs parallel to the inland highway, but only about two thirds of it are paved.

The remaining small roads in the area, most of which run from the coastal settlements to the former State Highway 92, are gravel roads. However, there are also gravel roads that run along the Täer of the Owaka River and Tahakopa River and connect the main artery of the Catlins with the small communities of Clinton and Wyndham . The Waikawa Valley Road , which is also gravel, crosses the hills and joins the road from Tahakopa to Wyndham.

A railway line, the Catlins River Branch , connected the Catlins area to the South Island Main Trunk Line since the late 19th century . Construction of this line began in 1879, but it did not reach Owaka until 1896. Construction progressed slowly because of the difficult terrain; the end point in Tahakopa was not completed until 1915. The profitability of the route declined with the disappearance of the sawmills it served. So it was closed in 1971. Parts of the route are now used as hiking trails, including the 250 m long tunnel through the ("Tunnel Hill") between Owaka and Glenomaru .

Several coastal settlements have docks for boats, but these are normally only used by fishing boats and pleasure boats. The Catlins are not used by passenger or freight lines.

administration

The greater part of the Catlins is part of the Clutha District . One of the 14 councilors of the Clutha district council is directly elected by the Catlins Ward , which is largely congruent with the area. The Clutha District is in turn part of the Otago Region administered by the Otago Regional Council (ORC) in Dunedin. The Molyneux constituency , which roughly corresponds to the Clutha district, elects two members of the twelve-member regional council.

Roughly the western third of the Catlins is in the Southland District . One of the 14 members of the district council represents the Toetoes Ward , in which this part of the Catlins is located. It also includes the Wyndham area , which extends along Toetoes Bay and across Awarua Plain . The Southland District is part of the Southland Region, which is administered by the Southland Regional Council (SRC; also Environment Southland ), which is based in Invercargill. The southern constituency of the SRC includes the Toetoes Ward and the area beyond the Awarua Plain almost to Bluff in the west and Mataura in the north. He elects a member of the twelve-member regional council.

In the general election, the Catlins are part of the Clutha-Southland constituency . The constituency is in the New Zealand Parliament by former opposition leader Bill English of the New Zealand National Party represented (as of 2008) .

literature

  • DG Bishop, IM Turnbull (Ed.): Geology of the Dunedin Area. Institute of Geological & Nuclear Sciences, Lower Hutt 1996, ISBN 0-478-09521-X .
  • R. Buckingham, J. Hall-Jones: The Catlins. Department of Conservation, Invercargill 1985, ISBN 0-477-05758-6 .
  • Catlins Walks and Tracks Information. Department of Conservation / Te Papa Atawhai, Owaka 1993.
  • C. Then, Neville Peat : Dunedin, North and South Otago. GP Books, Wellington 1989, ISBN 0-477-01438-0 .
  • B. Fraser (Ed.): The New Zealand book of events. Reed Methuen, Auckland 1986, ISBN 0-474-00123-7 .
  • R. Kirkpatrick: Bateman Contemporary Atlas of New Zealand: The Shapes of Our Nation. David Bateman, Auckland 1999, ISBN 1-86953-408-5 .
  • Neville Peat: The Catlins and the Southern Scenic Route. University of Otago Press, Dunedin 1998, ISBN 1-877133-42-6 .
  • AW Reed: Place names of New Zealand. AH & AW Reed, Wellington 1975, ISBN 0-589-00933-8 .
  • AR Tyrrell: Catlins Pioneering. Otago Heritage Books, Dunedin 1989, ISBN 0-473-07935-6 .

Web links

Commons : The Catlins  - collection of images, videos and audio files
Wikivoyage: Catlins Coast  Travel Guide

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Peat (1998), p. 7.
  2. ↑ Peat (1998), pp. 24, 57.
  3. ↑ Kirkpatrick (1999). The map on panel 23 shows that the Catlins swell twice as often as most of the rest of New Zealand, including popular surfing spots such as Raglan and Piha .
  4. ↑ 46 Deep South . Paul Kennedy Photography , archived from the original on March 6, 2009 ; accessed on September 17, 2014 (English, original website no longer available).
  5. ^ Kiwi surfer makes it big , ONE News, March 18, 2003. Retrieved April 4, 2006.
  6. ↑ Kirkpatrick (1999). The map on panel 8 shows that 27.5% to 30% of rainy days west of the Tautuku area fall in autumn, while there is no distinct rainy season north of it. The rainfall variability map on the same page shows that the variation in annual rainfall for the Catlins is between ten and 15 percent, with the greatest deviations on the coast.
  7. ↑ a b c Peat (1998), p. 13.
  8. ^ The Catlins Coast . (PDF 407 kB) Department of Conservation , archived from the original on April 11, 2005 ; accessed on September 17, 2014 (English, original website no longer available).
  9. ↑ Buckingham and Hall-Jones (1985), p. 7.
  10. ^ Buckingham and Hall-Jones (1985), p. 9.
  11. ^ Then and Peat (1989), p. 135.
  12. ^ Reed (1975), p. 71.
  13. ^ Buckingham and Hall-Jones (1985), p. 10.
  14. ↑ Fraser (1986), p. 94.
  15. ^ Reed (1975), p. 392.
  16. ↑ Tyrrell (1989), pp. 139-140.
  17. ^ Tyrrell (1989), p. 137.
  18. ↑ Marine Reserves - Nugget Point / Tokata Proposal . Royal Forest and Bird Protection Society , archived from the original on March 24, 2007 ; accessed on September 17, 2014 (English, original website no longer available).
  19. ^ "Wrong place, wrong reasons for marine reserve" (original from the Otago Daily Times ), accessed March 31, 2006.
  20. ^ Buckingham and Hall-Jones (1985), p. 19.
  21. ↑ Buckingham and Hall-Jones (1985), pp. 21-23.
  22. ↑ natural history . In: The Catlins . Catlins Coast Inc. , archived from the original on February 12, 2006 ; accessed on May 19, 2019 (English, original website no longer available).
  23. ↑ Crimson Trail . (PDF 360 kB) CharterHolHarvey , archived from the original on October 7, 2006 ; accessed on September 17, 2014 (English, original website no longer available).
  24. ^ Buckingham and Hall-Jones (1985), p. 16.
  25. ^ Owaka Rural Center Community Profile . Statistics New Zealand , 2001, archived from the original on December 27, 2005 ; accessed on May 19, 2019 (English, original website no longer available).
  26. ^ Tyrrell (1989), p. 146.
  27. ^ Tyrrell (1989), accessed March 31, 2006.
  28. ↑ Buckingham and Hall-Jones (1985), pp. 11-12.

Coordinates: 46 ° 30 ′ 0 ″  S , 169 ° 30 ′ 0 ″  E