Submissions called for Lake Wanaka 10 year plan

24 May 2005

Submitters to the draft 10 year Lagarosiphon Management Plan for Lake Wanaka are urged to make their voice heard before the deadline this Friday.

The plan sets out how the Lake Wanaka Lagarosiphon Managers' Committee proposes to control the invasive lakeweed Lagarosiphon in Lake Wanaka, says Committee spokesperson Paul Jackson from Land Information New Zealand.

"We've received a surprisingly low number of submissions so far given the pre-Christmas interest in Lake Wanaka weed control. It's essential that all of us, agencies, research advisers and the community take a long-term view of weed control in Lake Wanaka. We want to particularly hear from the public and we will take their views into account in the final plan."

Key elements of the plan include:

  • Continued use of a herbicide to attack high biomass beds of weed
  • More suction dredging and hand weeding
  • Continued education of lake users to prevent the spread of the weed

Public submissions close at 5pm Friday 27 May. The draft plan is available on the Land Information New Zealand and Queenstown Lakes District Council (QLDC) websites and in hard copy at the Queenstown and Wanaka QLDC offices. Interested parties should send clearly marked submissions care of the Queenstown Lakes District Council.

The 10 year plan follows on from last year's interim plan which saw a herbicide applied to the lake. A report assessing the results of the December 2004 weed control is now available on the LINZ website. The main points include:

  • diquat application was 80% successful (ie diquat worked well in 80% of the area it was used)
  • the management objective of preventing surface-reaching weed beds from establishing over the summer months was achieved
  • as recommended by the report, diquat has been reapplied to Paddock Bay and Parkin's Bay

The Managers' Committee will consider other recommendations from the report at its June meeting next week.

The Lake Wanaka Lagarosiphon Managers' Committee comprises: the Lake Wanaka Guardians, Queenstown Lakes District Council (QLDC), Otago Regional Council (ORC), the Department of Conservation and Land Information New Zealand (LINZ).

For further comment please contact Paul Jackson, 04 460 0158, Lake Wanaka Lagarosiphon Managers' Committee pjackson@linz.govt.nz

Media enquiries: Media Enquiries, Land Information New Zealand, phone +64 4 460 0110, email
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