FAREWELL SPIT
Farewell Spit runs from the east at Cape Farewell at the top of New Zealand’s South Island, providing the northern shelter to Golden Bay. The spit is around 35km long. The spit has approximately 27km above sea level, and extends another 8km under water.
HOW A SPIT IS CREATED
A spit is a deposition landform found off coasts. At one end, spits connect to land, while at the far end they exist in open water. A spit is a type of bar or beach that develops where a re-entrant occurs, such as at Fossil Point, by the process of longshore drift. Longshore drift (also called littoral drift) occurs due to waves meeting the beach at an oblique angle, and backwashing perpendicular to the shore, moving sediment down the beach in a zigzag pattern. Longshore drifting is complemented by longshore currents, which transport sediment through the water alongside the beach. These currents are set in motion by the same oblique angle of entering waves that causes littoral drift and transport sediment in a similar process.
Wind generated waves, driving mainly from the west and south-west, form Farewell Spit. Waves pick up grains of sand and deposit them continuously in a north-directed pattern up the coast. Offshore ocean currents are also a factor: fine silt is carried northwards and then eastwards by the Westland and d’Urville currents. Upon entering the sheltered waters of Golden Bay, the sand settles out and is deposited by wave action.
Wind shapes and reshapes the landscape. Massive dunes that queue along the spit’s northern margin shuffle slowly eastwards – pushed by the dominant western winds. A number of low vegetated dunes have formed at the Bay side of the spit, providing the only stability in this forever-changing landscape.
Farewell spit is still growing in length, but the main growth is in the widening of the spit. The visible spit is very much like the tip of an iceberg – the upper portion of a much larger underwater sand deposit. At least once, during the ice ages, when sea levels were much lower, the vast spit connected the South Island’s Golden Bay to the Wanganui/Manawatu area in the North Island.
HUMANS
Pre-European and local indigenous people, the Maori, called the spit Onetahua which means "heaped up sand". Maori seemed to have occupied the Spit for Moa hunting (large extinct flightless bird) and the harvesting of sea food and other birds. Puponga Point, once the site of a pa (fortification), is one of many archeological sites. The first European to see the spit was Dutchman Abel Tasman in 1642. He named the spit “Zand Duining Hoeck” (Sand Dune Hook).
The next European to visit was the Englishman Captain Cook, who named the area Cape Farewell as he left New Zealand in 1770, with early settlers calling the area Cape Farewell Spit.
A lighthouse was added to the eastern end of the spit in 1870, and it remains there today as a focal point for visitors on the organised tours (Public access only applies to the first four kilometres).
In early European times the sand dunes were partly covered in grass and forest, and sheep and cattle were grazed. Repeated burning and overstocking have led to the loss of most of the vegetation. Consequently the sand dunes are now active in most areas, apart from those with patches of scrub, marram grass, and lupins. In the early years the lighthouse site had no vegetation and windblown sand was an ongoing problem for the keepers. Then one clever keeper organised for small loads of soil to be delivered with the mail.
He planted a windbreak of macrocarpa pines which are still there to this day, and are visible from a far away as Nelson. The pines protect the station from the shifting sands and provide a daylight landmark for passing ships. The delivered soil had essential microbial life that was absent from the sands, and the key of life to the trees.
There are three homesteads near the lighthouse, one for each family of keepers, which in the early days were on a roster to keep the light burning.
The part of the spit that forms the Ramsar Wetland site, covering 11,388 ha, is managed by the Department of Conservation as a Nature Reserve and Shorebird Network Site. Apart from a small area at the base of the Spit, it is closed to the public except through organized tours.
FAUNA
The spit is home to thousands and thousands of birds with a Gannet colony, and with some very important species using this area as part of their annual migration path. It is also a place of many whale strandings, especially Long-Finned Pilot Whales. Farewell Spit has been a bird sanctuary since the 1930s and provides a home for over 90 bird species. Bar tailed godwits, knots, curlews, whimbrels and turnstones fly around 12,000 kilometres every northern hemisphere autumn to spend the summer here in the south.
GETTING THERE
(before you turn your GPS on)Make your way to Motueka, either via Nelson or Nelson Lakes National Park, and then make your way to Takaka over the Takaka Hill. From Takaka, turn towards Collingwood, but do not turn into Collingwood. Instead carry on until the road “runs out” and the signs show you have arrived at the Spit.
Questions to answer
To answer the questions below, please walk down (north) from the Information Centre/Cafe to these co-ords: S40 31.270 E 172 44.502 where you will find the Cetacean skeleton that needs to be visible in your photograph.
2025 UPDATE: Although some people still manage to log this EC with a photo of the skeleton, it appears it has been moved or is otherwise not as easy to find as it was so many years ago. An alternative photo would be with you, or something that identifies you, with the spit in the background
Additional information may need further research upon your return using the Internet and/or your library.
- What is the name of the type of dunes on Farewell Spit?
- What is the approximate leading angle of a typical dune?
- What is their approximate movement (in meters) per year?
Please post a photograph of yourself, with your GPS visible, in front of the skeleton to indicate you were really there, along with your thoughts as to why you think the spit would be a focal point for mass whale strandings.
Alternatively, for people who have a device where the camera and the GPS are in the same unit, or are opposed to posting pictures of themselves to the Internet, they must take a photo of the sign describing the whale skeleton and email this to the cache owner - DO NOT POST THAT PHOTO WITH YOUR LOG.
All answers must then be emailed to the cache owner PROMPTLY.
Logging protocol
You may log your find before receiving permission, but you must email your answers to the cache owner within a reasonable time frame, or risk having your log removed. To be safe, you should email the information at the same time as you log your find. Thank you