1.
Dunedin
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Dunedin is the second-largest city in the South Island of New Zealand, and the principal city of the Otago region. It is named for the capital of Scotland, generally Anglicised as Edinburgh, Dunedin was the largest New Zealand city by territorial land area until superseded by Auckland on the creation of the Auckland Council in November 2010. Dunedin was the largest city in New Zealand by population from the 1860s until about 1900, the city population at 5 March 2013 was 120,246. The Dunedin urban area lies on the central-eastern coast of Otago, the harbour and hills around Dunedin represent the remnants of an extinct volcano. The city suburbs extend out into the valleys and hills, onto the isthmus of the Otago Peninsula, and along the shores of the Otago Harbour. The citys most important activity in economic terms centres around tertiary education – Dunedin is home to the University of Otago, New Zealands first university, and the Otago Polytechnic. Students account for a proportion of the population,21.6 percent of the citys population was aged between 15 and 24 at the 2006 census, compared to the New Zealand average of 14.2 percent. In 2014 Dunedin was designated as a UNESCO Creative City of Literature, archaeological evidence shows the first human occupation of New Zealand occurred between AD 1250–1300, with population concentrated along the southeast coast. A camp site at Kaikai Beach, near Long Beach, has dated from about that time. There are numerous sites in what is now Dunedin, several of them large and permanently occupied. The population contracted but expanded again with the evolution of the Classic culture which saw the building of several pā, fortified settlements, notably Pukekura at, there was a settlement in what is now central Dunedin occupied as late as about 1785 but abandoned by 1826. Maori tradition tells first of a people called Kahui Tipua living in the area, then Te Rapuwai, semi-legendary, the next arrivals were Waitaha followed by Kāti Mamoe late in the 16th century and then Kai Tahu who arrived in the mid 17th century. These migration waves have often represented as invasions in European accounts. They were probably migrations like those of the European which incidentally resulted in bloodshed, the sealer John Boultbee recorded in the 1820s that the Kaika Otargo were the oldest and largest in the south. Lieutenant James Cook stood off what is now the coast of Dunedin between 25 February 1770 and 5 March 1770, naming Cape Saunders and Saddle Hill and he reported penguins and seals in the vicinity, which led sealers to visit from the beginning of the 19th century. Permanent European occupation dates from 1831, when the Weller brothers founded their whaling station at Otago, modern Otakou, epidemics badly reduced the Maori population. By the late 1830s the Harbour had become an international whaling port, johnny Jones established a farming settlement and a mission station, the South Islands first, at Waikouaiti in 1840. After inspecting several areas around the eastern coast of the south island, the name comes from Dùn Èideann, the Scottish Gaelic name for Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland
2.
South Island
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The South Island or Te Waipounamu is the larger of the two major islands of New Zealand, the other being the smaller but more populous North Island. It is bordered to the north by Cook Strait, to the west by the Tasman Sea, the South Island covers 150,437 square kilometres and has a temperate climate. In the early stages of European settlement of the country, the South Island had the majority of the European population, in prose, the two main islands of New Zealand are called the North Island and the South Island, with the definite article. Charcoal drawings can be found on rock shelters in the centre of the South Island. The drawings are estimated to be between 500 and 800 years old, and portray animals, people and fantastic creatures, possibly stylised reptiles, some of the birds pictured are long extinct, including moa and Haasts eagles. They were drawn by early Māori, but by the time Europeans arrived, early inhabitants of the South Island were the Waitaha. They were largely absorbed via marriage and conquest by the Kāti Mamoe in the 16th century, Kāti Mamoe were in turn largely absorbed via marriage and conquest by the Kāi Tahu who migrated south in the 17th century. While today there is no distinct Kāti Mamoe organisation, many Kāi Tahu have Kāti Mamoe links in their whakapapa and, a notable feature of the Moriori culture, an emphasis on pacifism, proved disadvantageous when Māori warriors arrived in the 1830s aboard a chartered European ship. In the early 18th century, Kāi Tahu, a Māori tribe who originated on the east coast of the North Island, There they and Kāti Mamoe fought Ngāi Tara and Rangitāne in the Wairau Valley. Ngāti Māmoe then ceded the east coast regions north of the Clarence River to Kāi Tahu, Kāi Tahu continued to push south, conquering Kaikoura. By the 1730s, Kāi Tahu had settled in Canterbury, including Banks Peninsula, from there they spread further south and into the West Coast. In 1827-1828 Ngāti Toa under the leadership of Te Rauparaha successfully attacked Kāi Tahu at Kaikoura, Ngāti Toa then visited Kaiapoi, ostensibly to trade. When they attacked their hosts, the well-prepared Kāi Tahu killed all the leading Ngāti Toa chiefs except Te Rauparaha, Te Rauparaha returned to his Kapiti Island stronghold. After destroying Te Maiharanuis village they took their captives to Kapiti, John Stewart, though arrested and sent to trial in Sydney as an accomplice to murder, nevertheless escaped conviction. In the summer of 1831–32 Te Rauparaha attacked the Kaiapoi pā, Kaiapoi was engaged in a three-month siege by Te Rauparaha, during which his men successfully sapped the pā. They then attacked Kāi Tahu on Banks Peninsula and took the pā at Onawe, in 1832-33 Kāi Tahu retaliated under the leadership of Tūhawaiki and others, attacking Ngāti Toa at Lake Grassmere. Kāi Tahu prevailed, and killed many Ngāti Toa, although Te Rauparaha again escaped, fighting continued for a year or so, with Kāi Tahu maintaining the upper hand. Ngāti Toa never again made an incursion into Kāi Tahu territory
3.
New Zealand
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New Zealand /njuːˈziːlənd/ is an island nation in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. The country geographically comprises two main landmasses—the North Island, or Te Ika-a-Māui, and the South Island, or Te Waipounamu—and around 600 smaller islands. New Zealand is situated some 1,500 kilometres east of Australia across the Tasman Sea and roughly 1,000 kilometres south of the Pacific island areas of New Caledonia, Fiji, because of its remoteness, it was one of the last lands to be settled by humans. During its long period of isolation, New Zealand developed a distinct biodiversity of animal, fungal, the countrys varied topography and its sharp mountain peaks, such as the Southern Alps, owe much to the tectonic uplift of land and volcanic eruptions. New Zealands capital city is Wellington, while its most populous city is Auckland, sometime between 1250 and 1300 CE, Polynesians settled in the islands that later were named New Zealand and developed a distinctive Māori culture. In 1642, Dutch explorer Abel Tasman became the first European to sight New Zealand, in 1840, representatives of Britain and Māori chiefs signed the Treaty of Waitangi, which declared British sovereignty over the islands. In 1841, New Zealand became a colony within the British Empire, today, the majority of New Zealands population of 4.7 million is of European descent, the indigenous Māori are the largest minority, followed by Asians and Pacific Islanders. Reflecting this, New Zealands culture is derived from Māori and early British settlers. The official languages are English, Māori and New Zealand Sign Language, New Zealand is a developed country and ranks highly in international comparisons of national performance, such as health, education, economic freedom and quality of life. Since the 1980s, New Zealand has transformed from an agrarian, Queen Elizabeth II is the countrys head of state and is represented by a governor-general. In addition, New Zealand is organised into 11 regional councils and 67 territorial authorities for local government purposes, the Realm of New Zealand also includes Tokelau, the Cook Islands and Niue, and the Ross Dependency, which is New Zealands territorial claim in Antarctica. New Zealand is a member of the United Nations, Commonwealth of Nations, ANZUS, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, Pacific Islands Forum, and Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation. Dutch explorer Abel Tasman sighted New Zealand in 1642 and called it Staten Landt, in 1645, Dutch cartographers renamed the land Nova Zeelandia after the Dutch province of Zeeland. British explorer James Cook subsequently anglicised the name to New Zealand, Aotearoa is the current Māori name for New Zealand. It is unknown whether Māori had a name for the country before the arrival of Europeans. Māori had several names for the two main islands, including Te Ika-a-Māui for the North Island and Te Waipounamu or Te Waka o Aoraki for the South Island. Early European maps labelled the islands North, Middle and South, in 1830, maps began to use North and South to distinguish the two largest islands and by 1907, this was the accepted norm. The New Zealand Geographic Board discovered in 2009 that the names of the North Island and South Island had never been formalised and this set the names as North Island or Te Ika-a-Māui, and South Island or Te Waipounamu
4.
Mole (architecture)
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A mole is a massive structure, usually of stone, used as a pier, breakwater, or a causeway between places separated by water. The word comes from Middle French mole, ultimately from Latin mōlēs, meaning a large mass, especially of rock, a mole may have a wooden structure built on top of it that resembles a wooden pier. The defining feature of a mole, however, is that water cannot freely flow underneath it, the oldest known mole is at Wadi al-Jarf, an ancient Egyptian harbor complex on the Red Sea. By extending the tracks the railroads could get beyond the mud flats. None of the four Bay Area moles survive today, although the causeway portions of each were incorporated into the filling in of large tracts of marshland for harbor and industrial development. The two concrete moles protecting the harbour at Dunkirk played a significant part in the evacuation of British. The harbour had been made unusable by German bombing and it was clear that troops were not going to be taken directly off the beaches fast enough, naval captain W. G. Tennant had been placed ashore to take charge of the navy shore parties and organise the evacuation. Tennant had what proved to be the highly successful idea of using the East Mole to take off troops, the moles had never been designed to dock ships, but despite this, the majority of troops rescued from Dunkirk were taken off in this way. Notable in antiquity was the Heptastadion, a giant mole built in the 3rd century BC in the city of Alexandria, Egypt to join the city to Pharos Island where the Pharos lighthouse stood. The Heptastadion is also believed to have served as an aqueduct while Pharos was inhabited, silting over the years resulted in the former dyke disappearing under several metres of accumulated silt and soil upon which the Ottomans built a town from 1517 onwards. Part of the city of Alexandria is now built on the site. When England acquired the north African city of Tangier as English Tangier in 1661, the English began building a mole to improve the harbour. The mole was planned to be 1,436 feet long and cost £340,000, and the harbour was to be 600 yd long,30 ft deep at low tide. Work began on the mole in August 1663 and continued for years under a succession of Governors. With an improved harbour the town would have played the role that Gibraltar later played in British naval strategy. A crippling blockade by the Jaysh al-Rifi finally forced the English to withdraw from Tangier in 1683, the King gave secret orders to abandon the city, level the fortifications, destroy the harbour, and evacuate the troops. Samuel Pepys was present at the evacuation and wrote an account of it, stone quaysides are sometimes called moles. A well-known example is the Molo in Venice and it is the site of the Doges Palace and two pillars which form a gateway to the sea
5.
Otago Harbour
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Otago Harbour is the natural harbour of Dunedin, New Zealand, consisting of a long, much-indented stretch of generally navigable water separating the Otago Peninsula from the mainland. They join at its southwest end,21 km from the harbour mouth and it is home to Dunedins deep water port facilities on its western shores in the suburb of Port Chalmers. The harbour was formed from the remnants of a giant shield volcano. The remains of this violent origin can be seen in the basalt of the surrounding hills, the last eruptive phase ended some ten million years ago, leaving the prominent peak of Mount Cargill. Substantial container port facilities exist at Port Chalmers,9 km along the shore from the harbour mouth. A channel along the side of the harbour is regularly dredged, allowing vessels with a draught of 12.5 m to Port Chalmers. New Zealands frozen meat export trade was inaugurated at Port Chalmers in 1882, the dredging of this channel, the Victoria Channel, was a major undertaking for the settlement of Dunedin in the 19th century. The eastern side of the harbour is shallow, with large sandbanks exposed at low tide, two islands form a line between Port Chalmers and Portobello in the lower harbour—Goat Island and Quarantine Island/Kamau Taurua. A smaller island known as Pudding Island lies close to the Peninsula shore, Portobello is home to one of New Zealands leading marine research establishments, the Portobello Marine Laboratory, a department of the University of Otago. This lies at the edge on the tip of a small arm of the Otago Peninsula. Near the mouth of the lies the township of Aramoana, infamous for a massacre of 13 people by a gunman, David Gray. This is also the site twice projected for New Zealands second aluminium smelter, the proposals, in the mid-1970s and early 1980s, were abandoned after major public protest. The harbour is tidal, shallow and seldom rough and for that reason is popular for sports such as yachting and windsurfing. A significant area at the head of the harbour has been reclaimed since the founding of Dunedin, smaller portions have also been reclaimed at a number of places around the harbour, including Port Chalmers, Macandrew Bay, and Broad Bay. As a part of the famous Otago Peninsula, the water is known for various rare wildlife. The area is the home of many species of wading birds, other bird species which visit the harbour include two species of penguins, little penguin and famous yellow-eyed penguins. Taiaroa Head, at the tip of the Otago Peninsula, is home to a colony of northern royal albatrosses, the bay and peninsula provides a critical habitat for Hookers sea lions and New Zealand fur seal. Southern elephant and leopard seals are occasional visitors into the harbor, in total, four species of pinnipeds, and at least nine or more species of cetaceans are known to inhabit or migrate through the area
6.
New Zealand sea lion
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The New Zealand sea lion numbers around 10,000 and is perhaps the worlds rarest sea lion species. They are the species of the genus Phocarctos. New Zealand sea lions are one of the largest New Zealand animals, like all otariids, they have marked sexual dimorphism, adult males are 240–350 cm long and weigh 320–450 kg and adult females are 180–200 cm long and weigh 90–165 kg. Adult females coats vary from buff to grey with darker pigmentation around the muzzle. Adult males are blackish-brown with a black mane of coarse hair reaching the shoulders. New Zealand sea lions are strongly philopatric, the main breeding populations are at the Auckland and Campbell Islands in the NZ Subantarctic, where approximately 99% of the species annual pup production occurs. There are currently three functioning breeding rookeries on the Auckland Islands, most sea lions are born on Dundas Island. A smaller rookery exists at Sandy Bay on Enderby Island and the smallest rookery is on Figure of Eight Island, an even smaller rookery at South East Point on Auckland Island appears to now have been abandoned. The other major breeding area is the Campbell Islands, for the first time in 150 years, sea lions began breeding again on the South Island coast in 1994, on the Otago Peninsula. Other small populations of breeding sea lions have recently begun to establish in various parts of the Stewart Island coastline and have been observed on the Catlins coast south of the Clutha River, recent DNA information indicates the New Zealand sea lion is a lineage previously restricted to subantarctic regions. It has been inferred from middens and ancient DNA that a lineage was made extinct at the Chatham Islands due to predation by the Moriori people. New Zealand sea lions are known to predate on a range of prey species including fish, cephalopods, crustaceans, seabirds. New Zealand sea lions are considered the most threatened sea lion in the world, the species status is largely driven by the main breeding population at the Auckland Islands, which declined by ~50% between 2000 and 2015. The 2013 sea lion pup production count on the Auckland Islands showed the number of pups born on the islands has risen to 1931, the 2013 number was the highest in five years. The Campbell Island population appears to be increasing slowly and births here comprise ~30% of the species total, the Otago and Stewart Island sea lion populations are currently small, though increasing. Population estimates for the species declined from ~15,000 in the mid-1990s to 9,000 in 2008. In 2010, the Department of Conservation—responsible for marine mammal conservation—changed the New Zealand Threat Classification System ranking from Nationally Endangered to Nationally Critical, the Department of Conservation estimates that Auckland Islands sea lions, nearly 80% of the total, could be functionally extinct by 2035. However, the New Zealand Ministry for Primary Industries considers research on which this prediction is based is low quality, subsistence hunting and commercial harvest of sea lions greatly reduced the breeding range and population size of New Zealand sea lions between the 13th and 19th Centuries
