Severe flooding in Dunedin this month delivered a hammer blow to some conservation groups and some of their projects will take years to fully recover.
Environmental groups are counting the cost of this month's floods with thousands of newly established and yet-to-be planted natives destroyed.
The Yellow Eyed Penguin Trust's Company Bay nursery was the hardest hit and trust general manager Sue Murray said as many as 6000 plants were destroyed.
Save The Otago Peninsula (Stop) volunteers have also been busy surveying losses but have also been out in force, planting natives in sensitive habitats and erosion-prone areas to prevent further damage.
Slips on the road to the Marine Science Centre and Quarantine Island mean only essential travel is allowed along there.
The Department of Conservation is also warning people to be wary of eroded tracks especially those in Bull Creek, Picnic Gully and Tunnel Beach.
The Sandfly Bay wildlife viewing hide has been closed because it is now hanging over the edge of an eroded sand hill.
Mrs Murray said they had lost about 6000 plants - mostly trees that were ready to plant out this winter as part of an ongoing programme of penguin habitat enhancement.
''A creek behind it burst its banks, flooded down through the nursery and took all the plants away ... a fair bit of damage to put it mildly.
''We think it could have an impact for anything from three to six years because it is not just plants that are ready to go out now that are damaged - it is also ones that would go out in the future.''
Yellow Eyed Penguin Trust nursery employee Anita Pillai, along with the rest of the nursery employees, is digging up the damaged plants so diggers can level the ground before replanting.
''It's affected every part of our nursery, from the tiny little seedlings right up to the plants that were ready to go this year. It will reduce the planting effort we can do for the penguins for the next three years,'' Ms Pillai said.
The nursery used plants to create breeding areas where the penguins could raise their chicks successfully, she said.
''They are essentially a forest-dwelling penguin and a lot of them are nesting in open areas. By providing a forest we can give the developing chicks shelter and shade as well as more protection from predators.
''There's definitely months' worth of work, for nursery staff and volunteers, just to get it back to the way it was. If we want to start growing plants again to get back into that cycle, we've got to start sowing seeds in the next few months and we don't have anywhere to do that at present because everything is in such turmoil.''
The nursery had received messages of support from all over the country and offers of help from volunteers.
''We are really grateful for those who have helped and we are hoping to include the others as we get on with our clean-up effort.''
Stop member Ian Frazer said there was quite a lot of damage in the Harbour Cone Reserve with slips scoured out by heavy rain and plants destroyed.
''There are some serious slips in that catchment area which is a bit worrying. We are going to have to look at some more remedial work in that catchment there.''
The damage had not dampened the enthusiasm of volunteers, who were back out planting at Victory Beach last week.
- by Dan Hutchinson and David Beck
