Seven years after first being established, the Wanaka-based Te Kakano Aotearoa Trust is seeing its model of habitat restoration inspiring groups in other communities to develop similar ventures.
The trust was set up in 2007 by a group of people who wanted to see a community nursery established to help foster native regeneration and reforestation projects.
The drive to establish the project was boosted when initial seed funding was provided by the Otago-based philanthropic trust the Sargood Bequest.
The 1200sq m nursery, situated on the western shores of Lake Wanaka near the Rippon Vineyard, was built in 2008 on land donated by the Blennerhasset Family, of Wanaka.
Since then, Te Takano (which translates as ''the Seed'') has raised thousands of native plants in the nursery - all except totara seedlings - raised from locally sourced seed.
Plantings have been carried out at numerous sites in the Upper Clutha, including along walking and cycling tracks, on Lake Wanaka islands and in pockets of wetlands in the area.
Nursery manager Andrew Penniket said along with planting days, working bees were held twice-weekly at the nursery with at least five to six volunteers attending each session.
''Hundreds of volunteers have clocked up thousands of hours since we first started. Some are members of the local community but we also often have visitors to Wanaka keen to help during their stay here.
''It is such a privilege to work with so many volunteers on these projects. You meet the best kind of people,'' Mr Penniket said during a working bee at Beacon Point wetland on Saturday.
What was especially pleasing was the number of children that in joined in, he said.
The trust had produced a ''blueprint'' outlining the steps it had taken and organisations around the country were using that as a template for their own projects.
Rabbits and water remained the biggest hurdle, Mr Penniket said. While seedlings were protected by netting ''rabbit [exclusion] cages'', volunteers would often carry in buckets to water some species until they were well established.
''The goal is produce strong species that can source their own water,'' Mr Penniket said.
- by Cris Johnston