“The flow-on effects of the funding have been huge. It’s created jobs for our remote community, and there’s more money going into our shops, supporting our economy,” says Beth Pearsall, Moehau ki te Moana Project Coordinator.
Together, we've provided the Moehau ki te Moana project with over 49,000 native trees - supporting their mahi to restore the waterways and biodiversity around Coromandel’s Moehau Range.
Water temperatures dropping, birdlife returning, meaningful jobs in a small, remote community: the positive outcomes for people and place are tangible. 🌿
🔗Head to our bio for the full story.
@colvillejunctiontrust
Last month, David and Di Chamberlin were named winners of the Ministry for the Environment Biodiversity Award at the 2026 Auckland Ballance Farm Environment Awards. And it couldn’t have been more deserved. 🏆
On Pōnui Island in the Hauraki Gulf, the Chamberlins are restoring 222 hectares of native bush and wetland on a working sheep and beef farm. It’s work that’s further protecting taonga species, like North Island brown kiwi - some of which are being translocated to help establish a new population on Waiheke Island.
Keen to strengthen community connection to nature, David and Di are also leading the establishment of a network of walking tracks, called the Tawapou Trail, throughout the regenerating landscape.
Their efforts demonstrate that traditional agriculture and deep care for the land can occur side-by-side. It’s meaningful mahi that we're proud to be backing, together with everyday New Zealanders like you. 🌿
📸 Photo of North Island brown kiwi: @arti.in.nature
Restoring ecosystems doesn't happen overnight. It takes patience, grit - and people who keep showing up. The Makaracarpas have all of that in abundance.💪
Exposed to the elements, the Mākara Estuary is a challenging place to work. But they’ve been at it for nearly 20 years - and what started as a small group has brought the Ohariu and Mākara communities together, including landowners and farmers, to restore the entire catchment.
Their mahi is improving water quality, protecting landscapes against erosion and reconnecting habitat now home to kiwi. 🌱
Together, we've been supporting them for the past seven years. Their dedication is a powerful reminder that this mahi is both collective and cumulative. And of what becomes possible when action for nature is ongoing.
Right now, more than 30,000 people and businesses are supporting Aotearoa New Zealand’s ngāhere with Trees That Count.
From whānau wanting to mitigate their impact on the environment and those keen to back their local community to people remembering someone dear to them - every action is powerful and together we’re creating a lasting legacy.
Here’s what supporting future native forests means to members of our growing community. 🌿⬆
From an island in the Hauraki Gulf to a former gold rush town in Central Otago - stories of nature’s regeneration are unfolding in every corner of Aotearoa.
🌿On Pōnui Island, the Chamberlin family is leading a project to recloak two valleys in native bush and inspire the next generation of kaitiaki. Central to their vision is establishing the Tawapou Trail, and eventually a learning centre, to strengthen community connection to nature. Their mahi is also protecting the island’s many kiwi, with some being translocated to nearby Waiheke Island to start a new population.
🌿Over a thousand kilometres south, the @arrowtownchoppers are removing wilding pines and reintroducing rākau like beech to help the landscape recover from the impacts of mining, wildfires and invasive species. With native species self-propagating and more fledgling manu being spotted, their longer-term hope is to nurture native forest biodiverse enough to welcome back kea, kākā and robin.
By funding native trees, you’re part of something vital. Together we've supported more than 800 projects like these since 2016 - giving them the critical backing they need. 🌱
3.2 million native trees planted across Aotearoa New Zealand since 2016. Behind that number are stories like this one. ⬇
Tucked into the pastoral landscapes of North Canterbury, Silverstream Reserve is home to something increasingly rare: pockets of the area's original ecosystems.
A spring-fed stream runs through the reserve, home to unique native biodiversity, like the boulder copper, one of the country’s smallest butterfly species. It's a place the local community comes to walk, gather kai and connect with nature.
Thanks to many years of dedicated volunteer effort, the reserve’s vital wetland and dryland ecosystems are regenerating. 🌿
Together, we’ve been supporting the Silverstream Reserve Restoration Project for nearly a decade.
It’s just one of hundreds across the motu backed by everyday New Zealanders like you to date - driving positive outcomes for nature and people alike. 💚
This #ConservationWeek, we’re celebrating the mahi behind the numbers - and those making it possible.
Recloaking an icon. ⛰
With panoramic summit views sweeping out over the Heretaunga Plains and Hawke’s Bay, Te Mata Peak is one of the region’s most loved places, attracting close to a million visitors each year.
These powerful photos capture the progress that’s possible in just two short years when communities come together to care for the land.
To date, businesses and everyday New Zealanders have helped fund more than 17,000 native trees via Trees That Count, amplifying @tematapark restoration project's efforts.
Their vital mahi is part of a much larger, long-term strategy to protect, enhance and restore ecosystems across the maunga. 🌿
📸 Photo credit: @the.surveying.company
One of Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland’s most ambitious restoration projects just marked a milestone: a new native plant nursery, helping scale up efforts to improve the health of the Papakura Stream. 🌱💧
Once an important source of kai, a portage route for waka and cloaked in thriving native bush, significant land-use change left the 63 kilometre stream among the most degraded waterways in the country. Since 2021, the Papakura Stream Restoration Project, led @conservationvolunteersnz (CVNZ), CVNZ), has been working alongside landowners, businesses and local communities to change that.
The new nursery builds on this in a major way by creating a reliable supply of native plants grown from remnant bush. Growing seedlings within the same catchment they’ll be planted in helps keep the restoration process local, maintaining the area’s unique biodiversity and giving the plantings the best chance of success.
Trees That Count funders have been backing the Papakura Stream Restoration Project from the outset, enabling the planting of 23,000 native trees to date, with a further 4,000 heading to the catchment this year, contributing to its ongoing ecological recovery.
We recently caught up with Rosa from CVNZ at Donald’s Farm, one of the project’s key sites and home to the new nursery. 🌿
Tourism connects people to Aotearoa New Zealand’s unique landscapes, but it also puts pressure on them. It’s a tension the team at @wendekreisentravelltd is deeply aware of.
For Managing Director Sascha Warnken, funding native trees for every rental booking felt like a logical step. 🌱
Seven years, 18,000+ trees later and counting, he says it’s become one of Wendekreisen’s most meaningful investments in Aotearoa New Zealand’s future.
We sat down with Sascha to learn more. Link in bio. 🔗
“We celebrate when we see a native species we’ve planted self-seed.”
Standing under one of 50 lightwells dotted across Te Raekaihau Point, Brian Walters explains how Te Ohu o Te Raekaihau is harnessing this method - working with nature to help re-establish biodiverse indigenous forest.
By creating small, intentional gaps in the forest canopy, the native seedlings the team plants below - along with those that self-seed - receive the vital sunlight they need to survive and thrive.
Wai.💧
Our freshwater systems are one of our most precious resources. And one that our native trees and riparian plants play an essential role in supporting. Stabilising banks, filtering runoff, regulating temperatures.
In Aotearoa, two-thirds of our drinking supply is sourced from surface water, such as rivers, streams and lakes. And depending on where you live in the country, like Otago, this could be upwards of 80%.
Clean water isn’t just integral to our own health, wellbeing and livelihoods. Many taonga species rely on thriving freshwater ecosystems for their survival.
While many of our vital bodies of water are feeling the pressure of decades of land-use change, communities across the motu are working hard to restore them.
Iwi, hapū, landowners, restoration teams, communities, businesses, everyday New Zealanders. Growing future native forests takes collective effort.
Whether you’re involved in on-the-ground restoration mahi or have funded native trees, you’re part of something vital and lasting: helping create the conditions in which whenua, biodiversity and people can flourish. 🌿
Here’s a glimpse into some of the outcomes you’ve helped make possible over the past year. ⬇️
Together, we can sustain this momentum for te taiao throughout 2026.
@tasmanenvirotrust@projectislandsong@northlandregionalcouncil@wakatipureforestationtrust@fgs_nz
