Every Waitangi Day, I plant something native. Not because I’m that fond of natives – in fact, give me a rhododendron any old day – but because I have a couple of friends who are eco-warriors and they make me do it.
I suppose I should thank them for the fact I now have a respectable grove of tree ferns, three thriving kaka beaks – which I have secretly come to love – a kowhai and a few other quite acceptable frondy green things I can’t remember the names of.
However, when I plant this year’s native tree it will be because I have just been to meet another eco-warrior who is one of New Zealand’s most respected native plant experts. Sadly, she wasn’t in her garden.
Muriel Fisher (95) lives at Patrick Ferry House in Auckland and has done for the past year. She can no longer work in her own garden, but she’s able to recall her remarkable history as an activist who has fought long and hard to save New Zealand’s native forests.
She has written books on the subject and is credited with helping to change the attitude of New Zealanders towards gardening with native plants.
Now she’s taken another step in the fi ght for New Zealand’s flora and fauna, lending her expertise to a landscaping project designed to provide residents of the rest home at Patrick Ferry House with a new outlook on life.
Management had been intending to plant out a sloping area at one side of its main building with natives, giving the 25 rooms in that area a new aspect. Many of the occupants of those rooms are bed-ridden, so the idea was to plant trees that will encourage native birds.
Muriel had the knowledge to be involved in the project, which saw more than 600 natives planted. Some were donated by the Kaipatiki Trust urban restoration project and others by the Native Fern Nursery and Fern Glen.
Muriel’s love of native plants began in childhood when her father took her walking every Sunday morning. “Most children went to church; we went for walks in the Wellington hills and I soon became acquainted with the plants,” she says.
“I intended to go to university and study botany, but the Depression came and I had to leave school and go to work as a clerk.” Her rather dull job did nothing to dampen her enthusiasm, or her intention, to work with plants.
In her late teens, she formed the desire to see alpine plants growing in their native habitat. “My father was horrified I would consider sleeping in a hut in mixed company, but I joined the Tararua Tramping Club and finally got down south.”
Muriel continued to confound her father, later moving to Auckland despite him saying she couldn’t live in a “garrison city”. But move she did, eventually meeting her husband, who also had an interest in native plants.
Muriel and Bill established a collection of more than 700 native plants in their garden in Auckland, now known as Fernglen Native Plant Gardens. Today Fernglen is devoted solely to the growing and preservation of New Zealand plants.
Well-maintained walking tracks take visitors to many interesting species, including two 300-year-old kauri, ancient rimu clothed in epiphytes, and the smallest conifer and the largest forget-me-not in the world.
