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THE LEAVE ONLY TRAILS FUND HAS BEEN ESTABLISHED TO PROMOTE SUSTAINABILITY AND ENVIRONMENTAL RESTORATION FOR HUNTERS AND ANGLERS.
The world’s going to hell in a hand-basket! Or it’s actually not that bad and people are overreacting. Whatever your spin on it, everyone should agree that recycling some trash, planting some trees, cleaning up a river and giving our animals a helping hand is well worth doing. So in conjunction with the Hunters Element Sustainability Promise, the fund was established to contribute additional help to the things that matter to us... the outdoor adventurers. And hopefully we can make things a little nicer out there for the next generation.
The purpose of the Leave Only Trails Fund is to raise money to invest in positive, environmental projects in our communities and give back to the wicked-cool areas that give so much to us.
The primary source of money is generated from sales of marked Hunters Element products. A portion of revenue from these products will be fed into the fund.
The money is then spent on projects that the whole Hunters Element team agree are well worth the investment. We will also be asking you guys to help us choose these worthy causes. The funds raised and projects will be shown right here so everyone can see where their money is going the difference they are making.
A quintessential part of being a kiwi is enjoying our waterways and coastlines. Through the Leave Only Trails Fund we are proudly a Bronze sponsor for Sustainable Coastlines, a charity who enable kiwis to look after our water. They do this by hosting and providing tools for clean up events, restoring rivers through riparian planting and educating the next generation on the effects of littering.
Through this partnership we are supporting their vision of beautiful beaches, healthy waters and inspired people, through three core programmes that directly involve communities in positive outcomes for the coastlines and waterways they love: Love Your Coast, Love Your Water and Litter Intelligence. Each program addresses the issue of rubbish in our waterways at different stages. This multi-pronged approach is why we back this organisation.
For every product sold with the Leave Only Trails Fund tag, you enable us to help Sustainable Coastlines to remove 3L of litter from New Zealand’s coastlines through their Love Your Coast programme.
New Zealand’s rivers are not in the best shape. 62% of monitored lowland rivers are not safe to swim in, even the fish have disappeared. Instead of the clean rocky river beds, we now have silt which does not support food or habitat for fish. Over the years, we cleared lowland forest to make way for settlements, farming, forestry and agricultural land. These trees provided shade, structural habitat and strength to river banks keeping the river healthy to support an abundance of life.
The health of our waterways affects all New Zealanders, and we would like to see the quality of our lowland waterways improved to see the natural ecosystem thrive and allow future generations to enjoy our rivers and streams. To get our waterways back into shape the solution is to restore the banks of our streams, river and lakes with riparian planting which we believe is worth investing in.
We are supporting Wai Wanaka’s Cardrona Kaitaki project in Otago by sponsoring 100m of riparian planting through the Million Meters organisation by Sustainable Business Network. In an area that has provided us with years of enjoyment in fishing, we want to help restore and protect the lowland rivers and get them back to an abundant lifeforce.
Find out more about the project and others like this with Million Meters Streams Project.
You might recognise this little guy from the New Zealand $10 note. As one of our rarest birds, the Whio, or Blue Duck, needs our help to continue surfing our white-water rivers. These unique birds are camouflaged for this unique environment and have a lip on their bill which allows them to forage for insects amongst rocks. As they need fresh water to be able to establish a home where their food thrives, they are a great indicator of the health of the water.
There are two main threats that have affected the number of these birds in the wild. As good water quality is a high priority, the degradation of many of our rivers by silt and other pollutants has resulted in many rivers being unsuitable as habitat. We also cannot ignore the familiar story that before the introduction of pests like stoats, weasels, ferrets and rats the Whio thrived.
We support The Blue Duck Project in the central north island and the Mangaotane Whio Conservation Project in the southern Raukumara on the East Coast, north of Gisborne, in protecting their Whio residents. This involves controlling predators along the margins of the river, particularly during the nesting and fledging season, between August and January. We have donated several effective and easy maintenance A24 traps to these organisations. Through trapping, we can give the Blue ducks a chance to nest, raise their young and build up their numbers so we can see these in abundance on our rivers once again.
