Moehau Range facts for kids

The Moehau Range is a mountain range at the very top of the Coromandel Peninsula in New Zealand. It stretches from the town of Colville all the way north to the end of the peninsula. The highest point in this range is Mount Moehau, which stands 892 meters (about 2,926 feet) above the sea.

Exploring the Land: Physical Geography

The Moehau Range is the main part of an area called the Colville Ecological District. This district is known for its long ridges, steep streams flowing to the coast, and hilly areas. It also has flat floodplains, harbors, and estuaries (where rivers meet the sea).

The Colville Ecological District covers a huge area of about 77,201 hectares (that's like 190,767 acres!). A big part of this land, 59%, is covered in native plants, and 8% is untouched, old-growth forest. Rivers like the Waikawau River drain the southern part of the range.

How the Mountains Were Made: Geology

Most of the Moehau Range is made of special rocks called metamorphic rocks. These include greywacke, sandstones, and siltstones. They were formed around 150 million years ago, during the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods. These rocks don't have many fossils, but they are mixed with other types of sandstone, siltstone, and mudstone.

In the southwest part of the range, you can find a type of rock called the Paritu Pluton. This rock formed about 17 million years ago from magma that cooled slowly underground. It includes rocks like granodiorite and quartz diorite. Around 15 million years ago, other volcanic rocks, like andesite and quartz porphyry, pushed their way into the older rocks.

'Granite' Quarries: Rocks for Buildings

Even though it's called "Coromandel granite," the rock quarried here is actually a type of quartz diorite. It was first advertised in 1900. People dug out this rock from quarries along the coast, like the Paritu quarry. In 1918, the Coromandel Granite Company took over and built a wharf to ship the rock.

This strong rock has been used to build many famous buildings and monuments in New Zealand. Some examples include Parliament House in Wellington, the Auckland Chief Post Office, the Auckland War Memorial Museum, the Auckland Ferry Terminal, and the old Auckland Railway Station. Quarrying stopped in the 1960s, but one quarry, Moehau quarry, was reopened in the 1990s to help fix up Parliament House.

People of the Range: Demographics

The Moehau Range area is not very crowded. In 2013, only 129 people lived north of Port Charles Road, which covers the entire range. They lived in 63 houses. This area is part of the wider Te Rerenga census area, where many houses are holiday homes and are not lived in all the time.

The main small towns in the area are Port Jackson and Port Charles.

Port Jackson

Port Jackson is a bay on the northern coast of the Coromandel Peninsula, just south of Cape Colville.

Port Charles

Captain Cook named Port Charles in 1769. A sawmill operated here from 1865 to 1890, cutting down trees. Ships from the Northern Steamship Company used to visit Port Charles. The road connecting Port Charles to Colville opened in 1928.

This area has faced severe floods. In 1950, a flood was so strong it moved the local school off its foundations, causing it to close. In 2002, floods damaged 23 homes, and another big flood happened in 2016. The beach in Port Charles is also slowly being washed away by the sea.

Ancient Stories: History

Mount Moehau is a very special and sacred place for the Marutūāhu tribes of Māori people. Many important chiefs, including Tama-te-kapua from the Te Arawa tribe, are buried on its summit. The full name of the mountain is Te Moengahau-o-Tamatekapua, which means "the windy sleeping place of Tamatekapua."

Amazing Nature: Biodiversity

The Moehau Range is known as one of New Zealand's six "biodiversity hot spots." This means it has a very rich and unique variety of plants and animals. The Moehau peak has special native plants that are rare for a North Island forest. You can find trees like silver pine, pink pine, kaikawaka, sweet hutu, and southern rata. It's also the northernmost place where you can find many plants that usually grow further south in the mountains, like mountain toatoa and mountain cedar.

The range is also famous for a rare native animal called the Archey's frog (Leiopelma archeyi). What's special about these frogs is that their young hatch directly from eggs, skipping the tadpole stage! Moehau is also home to its own special Moehau stag beetle (Geodorcus sp.), the Moehau wētā (Hemiandrus sp.), and a group of about 500 brown kiwi.

The Moehau Environment Group [1] is a group that works hard to protect and improve the natural environment of the Northern Coromandel Peninsula. In 2020, they received money to help control pests like possums, mustelids (like stoats and ferrets), rats, and cats over a large area of 15,000 hectares. This helps protect the native plants and animals.