This cache teaches you to recognise two of New Zealand’s native trees that are very similar. It is the fourth in a series of caches situated close to native trees.

The higher terrain rating allocated relates to the slightly precarious position you need to get into to retrieve the cache, not the track to reach the tree at GZ which is terrain 1.

Tawhairaunui

Common name: Hard beech

Scientific name: Nothofagus truncata

Tawhairaunui is applied by Maori to both the Hard beech (the tree at GZ) and the similar Red beech, Nothofagus fusca.

The Hard beech can grow up to 30 metres high with a trunk up to 2 metres across. The trunk is often buttressed in larger trees: the tree at GZ has buttresses. It grows from sea level to 900 metres altitude from Mangonui in Northland southwards as far as Greymouth on the West Coast of the South Island. The tree is one of several New Zealand species that are partly deciduous in late winter or early spring, shedding some of its leaves en masse. 

The Red beech grows to a similar height as the Hard beech, though its trunk can get even bigger, up to 3 metres across. The foliage of red beech young trees is often a deep but bright red colour in winter. Foliage on mature trees often has a slight red tinge to the leaf edges. The mature red beech drops its old leaves in spring when the new leaves open. It grows from sea level to 1050 metres in altitude. It grows as far north as Te Aroha and southwards to Fiordland and Southland, so in Kaitoke the two beech species ranges are overlapping and you can see good examples of both species.

The Hard beech leaves are glossy and oval, with serrated edges, about 25 - 35 mm long and 20 mm wide. The Red beech leaves are a similar size, but are more pointed and with sharper teeth in the serrations compared to the hard beech.

In both species the bark is similar: more deeply furrowed and greyish in Red beech, more brown in Hard beech.

Hard beech wood is, as its name suggests, the hardest of all the native beech trees, whereas red beech wood is the most durable.

The male flowers of both species are red or orange.

The Hard beech tree at GZ is typical of many of the mature beech trees in Kaitoke Park. It is one of many beech trees of all species in the vicinity. A group of three Red beech trees stand close by at the indicated Waypoint co-ordinates so you can see the differences.

The cache

The cache is a 200 ml Sistema and at time of placement contained a log sheet only. Please cover carefully as you found it after signing the log, to prevent it from being muggled: the tree is rather close to the road and many cars pass each day on a summer's weekend and especially during the summer holiday period as people make their way to a nearby popular swimming hole.