Hakarimata Range is a range of hills on the western edge of
Ngāruawāhia
Ngāruawāhia () is a town in the Waikato region of the North Island of New Zealand. It is located north-west of Hamilton, New Zealand, Hamilton at the confluence of the Waikato River, Waikato and Waipā Rivers, adjacent to the Hakarimata Rang ...
township,
[ Retrieved 2016] in the
Waikato
The Waikato () is a region of the upper North Island of New Zealand. It covers the Waikato District, Waipā District, Matamata-Piako District, South Waikato District and Hamilton City, as well as Hauraki, Coromandel Peninsula, the nort ...
region of New Zealand, overlooking the confluence of the
Waikato
The Waikato () is a region of the upper North Island of New Zealand. It covers the Waikato District, Waipā District, Matamata-Piako District, South Waikato District and Hamilton City, as well as Hauraki, Coromandel Peninsula, the nort ...
and
Waipā Rivers. The Hakarimata Range is separated from the
Taupiri Range by the
Taupiri Gorge, through which the Waikato River flows.
After the
invasion of the Waikato, parts of the Hakarimatas were
confiscated in 1864. of native forest on the range are protected as a
scenic reserve.
A council supported community group, the Hakarimata Restoration Trust, created in 2001, is helping care for the range.
Location
Although now usually applied to the hills immediately west of Ngāruawāhia, maps such as Hochstetter's of 1859, the 1925 geology map and 1944 one inch map show 'Hakarimata Range' as extending south to what is now
SH23. Similarly, old accounts describe the
Whatawhata-
Raglan road as passing over the Hakarimatas.
Name
Hakarimata's name derives from a 17th-century feast, when
Ngāti Maniapoto joined the local
Waikatos to celebrate the birth of a child. There was a mountain of raw forest foods; hence the name Hākari-kai-mata (uncooked food mountain), condensed to Hakarimata.
Geology
Hakarimata is part of the roughly north - south Kawhia
Syncline
In structural geology, a syncline is a fold with younger layers closer to the center of the structure, whereas an anticline is the inverse of a syncline. A synclinorium (plural synclinoriums or synclinoria) is a large syncline with superimposed ...
(
Taupiri
Taupiri is a small town of about 500 people on the eastern bank of the Waikato River in the Waikato District of New Zealand. It is overlooked by Taupiri mountain, the sacred burial ground for the Waikato tribes of the Māori people, located ...
to the north, Kapamahunga to the south), though the Hakarimata
Anticline
In structural geology, an anticline is a type of Fold (geology), fold that is an arch-like shape and has its oldest Bed (geology), beds at its core, whereas a syncline is the inverse of an anticline. A typical anticline is convex curve, c ...
is at about a 30° angle to the rest of the syncline, probably due to
strike slip movement along the
Waipa Fault,
Late Triassic
The Late Triassic is the third and final epoch (geology), epoch of the Triassic geologic time scale, Period in the geologic time scale, spanning the time between annum, Ma and Ma (million years ago). It is preceded by the Middle Triassic Epoch a ...
Newcastle Group,
sandstone
Sandstone is a Clastic rock#Sedimentary clastic rocks, clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of grain size, sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate mineral, silicate grains, Cementation (geology), cemented together by another mineral. Sand ...
s,
siltstone
Siltstone, also known as aleurolite, is a clastic sedimentary rock that is composed mostly of silt. It is a form of mudrock with a low clay mineral content, which can be distinguished from shale by its lack of fissility.
Although its permeabil ...
s and
greywacke
Greywacke or graywacke ( ) is a variety of sandstone generally characterized by its hardness (6–7 on Mohs scale), dark color, and Sorting (sediment), poorly sorted angular grains of quartz, feldspar, and small rock fragments or sand-size Lith ...
have been folded, faulted and covered by other
sedimentary
Sedimentary rocks are types of rock formed by the cementation of sediments—i.e. particles made of minerals (geological detritus) or organic matter (biological detritus)—that have been accumulated or deposited at Earth's surface. Sedime ...
rocks to form the Hakarimatas.
Flora and fauna
Plants
Hakarimata is the largest remnant of
broadleaf-
podocarp lowland forest that once dominated the Waikato. It is near the southern limit of
kauri
''Agathis'', commonly known as kauri or dammara, is a genus of evergreen coniferous trees, native to Australasia and Southeast Asia. It is one of three extant genera in the family Araucariaceae, alongside '' Wollemia'' and ''Araucaria'' (being ...
forest and northern limit of
beech
Beech (genus ''Fagus'') is a genus of deciduous trees in the family Fagaceae, native to subtropical (accessory forest element) and temperate (as dominant element of Mesophyte, mesophytic forests) Eurasia and North America. There are 14 accepted ...
forest, with plants and animals of all three forest types. Occasional large
rata and
rimu
''Dacrydium cupressinum'', commonly known as rimu, is a species of tree in the family Podocarpaceae. It is a dioecious evergreen conifer, reaching heights of up to , and can have a stout trunk (botany), trunk up to in diameter. It is endemis ...
stand above the canopy of
tawa,
kohekohe,
hinau,
rewarewa,
mangeao and
pukatea. There are also some
miro,
Hall's totara and
tanekaha. The reserve also contains several threatened plants including
Alseuosmia quercifolia, or topara, which is strongly scented in spring.
Animals
Tūī
The tūī (''Prosthemadera novaeseelandiae'') is a medium-sized bird native to New Zealand. It is blue, green, and bronze coloured with a distinctive white throat tuft (poi). It is an endemism, endemic passerine bird of New Zealand, and the on ...
,
kererū
The kererū (''Hemiphaga novaeseelandiae''), also known as kūkupa (Māori language#Northern dialects, northern Māori dialects), New Zealand pigeon or wood pigeon, is a species of pigeon native to New Zealand. Johann Friedrich Gmelin describ ...
,
pīwakawaka,
pīpīwharauroa,
kārearea,
pekapeka,
copper skink
The copper skink (''Oligosoma aeneum'') is a skink of the family (biology), family Scincidae that is endemism, endemic to the North Island of New Zealand.
Taxonomy and systematics
The number of skink species endemic to New Zealand is not yet kn ...
,
Auckland green gecko and
peripatus are among the species in the bush. 16 species of native fish include
short and
longfinned eels and
banded,
short-jaw and
giant
In folklore, giants (from Ancient Greek: ''wiktionary:gigas, gigas'', cognate wiktionary:giga-, giga-) are beings of humanoid appearance, but are at times prodigious in size and strength or bear an otherwise notable appearance. The word ''gia ...
,
kōkopu.
In 1995/96, to connect the Hakarimata tree
canopy with the Waikato River, and thus encourage indigenous fish, three Waikato tributaries had of fences, 12 stock-water troughs, 5 bridges, and over 10,000 trees and shrubs added. By 2003, fish had increased from 63 to 80 fish per of stream and a new species,
lamprey
Lampreys (sometimes inaccurately called lamprey eels) are a group of Agnatha, jawless fish comprising the order (biology), order Petromyzontiformes , sole order in the Class (biology), class Petromyzontida. The adult lamprey is characterize ...
, was found.
Pests
Since the land was reserved (from 1905 onwards), the fringe areas and lower slopes have slowly regenerated after suffering light logging, fires, pigs, goats,
possums
Possum may refer to:
Animals
* Didelphimorphia, or (o)possums, an order of marsupials native to the Americas
** Didelphis, a genus of marsupials within Didelphimorphia
*** Common opossum, native to Central and South America
*** Virginia opossum, ...
, cats,
hedgehogs, rats, mice,
stoats, weasels and ferrets, with occasional deer and
wallaby
A wallaby () is a small or middle-sized Macropodidae, macropod native to Australia and New Guinea, with introduced populations in New Zealand, Hawaii, the United Kingdom and other countries. They belong to the same Taxonomy (biology), taxon ...
. Goats, possum and rats are controlled,
with possum
self-resetting traps trialled in 2011. About of privately owned forest adjoin the reserve, some of which is protected by covenant.
Kauri dieback disease is not present, so a boot cleaning station was put at the Huntly end in 2015.
Fire is also a threat. In 2017 an area of 600 by 300m on a ridge beside the quarry was burnt.
Quarry
The large quarry at 181 Waingaro Road, Ngāruawāhia, opened in a
quarry reserve in 1948
and now goes well below sea-level. It was bought by Brian Perry Ltd in the 1980s and sold to
Fulton Hogan in 2016. An extension which would have doubled the size of the quarry
wasn't permitted in 2008. It would have taken native trees estimated to be 800 years old. The quarry then employed 13 and supplied about 35% of the area's needs.
Environment Waikato granted Perry Aggregates resource consents in 2009, following which
bait stations were put in the area in 2011 and the quarry was given Mimico Environmental Awards for that and, in 2018, for extending native
fish passage.
Tracks
The range has been used for recreational rambling since at least 1892.
There are two main walkways through the range, allowing excellent views of the
Waikato Plains below. The main one is Hakarimata Walkway (12 km, 7 hr 30 min) along the ridge from Parker Road at the northern end to the Hakarimata Rail Trail (off Waingaro Rd) at the south.
Te Araroa follows that walkway to the summit,
where a viewing tower offers vistas towards the coast, across the Waikato Basin and to Ruapehu on a clear day.
Te Aroroa drops from the summit by the other main walkway, Hakarimata Summit Track
(2 km, 3 hr return, 335 metres on 1349 steps), to Brownlee Avenue in Ngāruawāhia.
The steps had 140,000 visits in 2016, compared to 5000 in 2011, shortly after they opened. The remainder of the track south to Hakarimata Rail Trail (3.5 km, 2 hr) can be linked by a 1.8 km walk along Waingaro Road back to Brownlee Ave.
There are several shorter walks using parts of the Hakarimata Walkway and/or the Summit Track:-
* At the northern end, Kauri Loop Track (3 km, 2 hr return for full loop; 40 min to kauri grove) from Parker Road car park starts with a long flight of steps to one of the largest kauris in Waikato,
girth and high, estimated to be over a thousand years old. The Southern Lookout has views of Huntly and the north Waikato lakes, Hamilton and Tongariro on a clear day.
* In the middle, Waterworks Walk (1 km, 1 hr return) from Brownlee Avenue runs beside Mangarata Stream to the 1922 reservoir, once
Ngāruawāhia's water supply.
In November 2016 a Tomokanga (archway)
was added near the beginning of the walk.
* At the southern end, Hakarimata Rail Trail (1.5 km, 30 min) follows the former
Glen Massey railway.
A short extension leads to the Cascades.
Gallery
File:Cascades on Hakarimata.jpg, Cascades at the foot of the ascent to the summit from the south
File:Mangarata Stream waterfall, Hakarimata.jpg, Mangarata Stream waterfall, just above the reservoir
File:Waikato basin from Hakarimata Summit.jpg, Ngāruawāhia, Waikato basin and Kaimais from Hakarimata Summit
File:Steps on Summit Track, Hakarimata.jpg, Some of the 1349 steps on the Summit Track
File:Mangarata Dam, Ngaruawahia Waterworks.jpg, Mangarata Dam spillway. Parataniwha is common in the valleys.
File:Hakarimata kauri tree.jpg, The platform is to protect the big tree from kauri dieback
File:Waikato River from Hakarimata.jpg, Huntly and Waikato River from Northern Lookout
References
{{reflist
External links
Photographs and further detailsPhoto of quarry
Mountain ranges of Waikato
Waikato District