Tarapuruhi Bushy Park

Tarapuruhi Bushy Park, about 25 minutes north of Whanganui near Kai Iwi, protects 89 hectares of rare lowland forest once common across the western North Island. Ngā Rauru Kītahi holds mana whenua here; the name reflects the site's abundance of birdlife. In the 1860s, amid contested land alienation, chief Uru Te Angina sold 391 hectares to Scottish settler James Moore. His son, Frank Moore, built the Bushy Park homestead in 1906 and ran a livestock and horse-breeding operation, but fenced the forest from stock in the early 1900s, preserving it while surrounding land was cleared for farming. Before his death in 1962, Moore bequeathed the forest, homestead and farm buildings to Forest & Bird. The Bushy Park Trust now manages the site with Forest & Bird and the local community. A 4.8-km predator-proof fence completed in 2005 turned it into a mainland ecological island, allowing rat and possum removal and the reintroduction of native birds like toutouwai, tīeke and hihi.