Stories from a forest soil

Abstract

Early in the European colonisation of New Zealand, settlers were attracted to the colony by promises of a land abounding in fertile soils. A similar subterfuge was used to encourage the wave of settlers pushing west in the 1860s in the United States, only then with the mantra 'The rain follows the plough' ringing in their ears. The misrepresentation of the fertility of New Zealand's soils was based on what has become known as the biometric fallacy - that tall forest, as greeted early explorers to New Zealand, indicates fertile soils. This fallacy is no better exemplified than in the beech and podocarp forests on the glacial landforms of Westland. The tall, dense forest belies soils impoverished by leaching by annual rainfalls measured in metres, over tens of thousands of years. The large biomass is supported by the forest's frugal use and efficient scavenging of nutrients, along with slow growth rates. This article examines an example of such soil from Saltwater Forest in Westland, from the perspective of both the processes that it results from, and the rich history of environmental change over tens of thousands of years that it records.