title: Satellite remote sensing for mapping vegetation in New Zealand freshwater environments: A review

authors: Ashraf, Muhammad Salman

subjects: emergent aquatic vegetation (EAV)

abstract: Freshwater environments in New Zealand provide a range of ecosystem services and contain important biodiversity. Managing these environments effectively requires a comprehensive inventory of the resource and cost-effective tools for regular monitoring. The complex and extensive margins of natural water bodies make them difficult to sample comprehensively. Problems thus occur with extrapolating point-specific sampling to accurately represent the diversity of vegetation in large freshwater bodies. Mapping freshwater vegetation using satellite remote sensing can overcome problems associated with access, scale and distribution, but it requires high-resolution images that have appropriate spectral characteristics. This paper provides an overview of the optical satellite data characteristics required for mapping riparian, submerged and emergent vegetation associated with freshwater environments in New Zealand.

text: Satellite remote sensing for mapping vegetation in New Zealand freshwater environments: A review Freshwater environments in New Zealand provide a range of ecosystem services and contain important biodiversity. Managing these environments effectively requires a comprehensive inventory of the resource and cost-effective tools for regular monitoring. The complex and extensive margins of natural water bodies make them difficult to sample comprehensively. Problems thus occur with extrapolating point-specific sampling to accurately represent the diversity of vegetation in large freshwater bodies. Mapping freshwater vegetation using satellite remote sensing can overcome problems associated with access, scale and distribution, but it requires high-resolution images that have appropriate spectral characteristics. This paper provides an overview of the optical satellite data characteristics required for mapping riparian, submerged and emergent vegetation associated with freshwater environments in New Zealand.

year: 2010

title: Diet selectivity in a terrestrial forest invertebrate, the Auckland tree wētā, across three habitat zones.

authors: Brown, Matthew

subjects: feeding behaviour

abstract: Insects are important but overlooked components of forest ecosystems of New Zealand. For many invertebrate species, information on foraging patterns and trophic relationships is lacking. We examined diet composition and selectivity in a large bodied invertebrate, the Auckland tree wētā, in three habitat zones in a lowland New Zealand forest. We asked if Hemideina thoracica selectively forage from available plant food sources, and if these choices were lipid-rich compared to non-preferred available plants. We also identified the proportion of invertebrates in their frass as a proxy for omnivory. From reconnaissance plot sampling, together with faecal fragment analysis, we report that more than 93% of individual wētā had eaten other invertebrates before capture. Wētā in the highest elevation hillslope habitat consumed significantly fewer plants on average than wētā on either the low elevation terrace or mid-slope habitat. Hillslope wētā also had the highest average number of invertebrate fragments in their frass, significantly more than wētā in the low elevation terrace habitat. Wētā showed high variability in the consumption of fruit and seeds across all habitats. Generally, we did not observe diet differences between the sexes (although it appears that male wētā in the mid hillslope habitat ate fruits and seeds more voraciously than females), suggesting that the sexes have similar niche breadths and display similar degrees of omnivorous behaviour. Extraction of leaf lipids demonstrated a range of lipid content values in available plants, and Ivlev’s electivity index indicated that plant species which demonstrated high electivity, tended to have higher concentrations of lipids in their leaves. Our findings indicate that H. thoracica forage omnivorously and selectively, and hence play multiple roles in native ecosystems and food webs.

text: Diet selectivity in a terrestrial forest invertebrate, the Auckland tree wētā, across three habitat zones. Insects are important but overlooked components of forest ecosystems of New Zealand. For many invertebrate species, information on foraging patterns and trophic relationships is lacking. We examined diet composition and selectivity in a large bodied invertebrate, the Auckland tree wētā, in three habitat zones in a lowland New Zealand forest. We asked if Hemideina thoracica selectively forage from available plant food sources, and if these choices were lipid-rich compared to non-preferred available plants. We also identified the proportion of invertebrates in their frass as a proxy for omnivory. From reconnaissance plot sampling, together with faecal fragment analysis, we report that more than 93% of individual wētā had eaten other invertebrates before capture. Wētā in the highest elevation hillslope habitat consumed significantly fewer plants on average than wētā on either the low elevation terrace or mid-slope habitat. Hillslope wētā also had the highest average number of invertebrate fragments in their frass, significantly more than wētā in the low elevation terrace habitat. Wētā showed high variability in the consumption of fruit and seeds across all habitats. Generally, we did not observe diet differences between the sexes (although it appears that male wētā in the mid hillslope habitat ate fruits and seeds more voraciously than females), suggesting that the sexes have similar niche breadths and display similar degrees of omnivorous behaviour. Extraction of leaf lipids demonstrated a range of lipid content values in available plants, and Ivlev’s electivity index indicated that plant species which demonstrated high electivity, tended to have higher concentrations of lipids in their leaves. Our findings indicate that H. thoracica forage omnivorously and selectively, and hence play multiple roles in native ecosystems and food webs.

year: 2018

title: Relational and culturally responsive supervision of doctoral students working in Māori contexts: Inspirations from the Kingitanga

authors: Glynn, Ted

subjects: Relational and culturally responsive supervision

abstract: There is much to celebrate in the greatly increased number of Māori and non-Māori students in New Zealand tertiary institutions undertaking doctoral research on issues of importance to Māori.
However, in honouring their commitments to the Treaty of Waitangi, tertiary institutions need to ensure that Māori doctoral students and their Māori communities maintain their right to define their own research questions, research paradigms and methodologies. As supervisors of doctoral research students investigating issues of significance to Māori people, it is essential that we learn to position ourselves as visitors in someone else’s cultural space, as partners in the Treaty of Waitangi, and as co-constructors of knowledge and research methodology rather than as experts and gatekeepers (Berryman, SooHoo, & Nevin, 2013; Glynn, 2012).

This paper was occasioned by an invitation from the organisers of the annual Kingitanga Day cultural and educational programme at the University of Waikato. The Kingitanga movement has much to teach us about how to frame and conduct research that responds to long-standing injustices that have marginalised Māori people. The Kingitanga has inspired us through the resistance, resilience, agency and humility of its leaders in asserting their right to define the effects of historic and contemporary injustices, and the right to define their own responses to these injustices.

In this paper, we explore some of the relational and culturally responsive understandings we have arrived at from supervising the research of four doctoral candidates in Education (two Māori and two non-Māori). This research has been designed to promote the success and wellbeing of Māori students in mainstream schools, addressing historic and ongoing injustices experienced by Māori students and their whānau and communities.

text: Relational and culturally responsive supervision of doctoral students working in Māori contexts: Inspirations from the Kingitanga There is much to celebrate in the greatly increased number of Māori and non-Māori students in New Zealand tertiary institutions undertaking doctoral research on issues of importance to Māori.
However, in honouring their commitments to the Treaty of Waitangi, tertiary institutions need to ensure that Māori doctoral students and their Māori communities maintain their right to define their own research questions, research paradigms and methodologies. As supervisors of doctoral research students investigating issues of significance to Māori people, it is essential that we learn to position ourselves as visitors in someone else’s cultural space, as partners in the Treaty of Waitangi, and as co-constructors of knowledge and research methodology rather than as experts and gatekeepers (Berryman, SooHoo, & Nevin, 2013; Glynn, 2012).

This paper was occasioned by an invitation from the organisers of the annual Kingitanga Day cultural and educational programme at the University of Waikato. The Kingitanga movement has much to teach us about how to frame and conduct research that responds to long-standing injustices that have marginalised Māori people. The Kingitanga has inspired us through the resistance, resilience, agency and humility of its leaders in asserting their right to define the effects of historic and contemporary injustices, and the right to define their own responses to these injustices.

In this paper, we explore some of the relational and culturally responsive understandings we have arrived at from supervising the research of four doctoral candidates in Education (two Māori and two non-Māori). This research has been designed to promote the success and wellbeing of Māori students in mainstream schools, addressing historic and ongoing injustices experienced by Māori students and their whānau and communities.

year: 2015