Young Nick's Head is a headland at the southern end of

Poverty Bay Poverty Bay (Māori: ''Tūranganui-a-Kiwa'') is the largest of several small bays on the east coast of New Zealand's North Island to the north of Hawke Bay. It stretches for from Young Nick's Head in the southwest to Tuaheni Point in the north ...

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

North Island The North Island, also officially named Te Ika-a-Māui, is one of the two main islands of New Zealand, separated from the larger but much less populous South Island by the Cook Strait. The island's area is , making it the world's 14th-largest ...

. The area is the landing place of the

Horouta In Māori tradition, the canoe ''Horouta'' was one of the great ocean-going canoes in which Polynesians migrated to New Zealand approximately 800 years ago. The story goes that Kahukura, a man from Hawaiki, introduced kūmara (sweet potato), t ...

and Te Ikaroa-a-Rauru

waka Waka may refer to: Culture and language * Waka (canoe), a Polynesian word for canoe; especially, canoes of the Māori of New Zealand ** Waka ama, a Polynesian outrigger canoe ** Waka hourua, a Polynesian ocean-going canoe ** Waka taua, a Māori w ...

which carried

Māori Māori or Maori can refer to: Relating to the Māori people * Māori people of New Zealand, or members of that group * Māori language, the language of the Māori people of New Zealand * Māori culture * Cook Islanders, the Māori people of the C ...

settlers to the region around 1350 AD. In

, the

promontory A promontory is a raised mass of land that projects into a lowland or a body of water (in which case it is a peninsula). Most promontories either are formed from a hard ridge of rock that has resisted the erosive forces that have removed the so ...

is named Te Kuri o Pāoa (alternatively known as Te Kuri, or Te Kuri a Pawa). The settlement of

Muriwai Muriwai, also called Muriwai Beach, is a coastal community on the west coast of the Auckland Region in the North Island of New Zealand. The black-sand surf beach and surrounding area is a popular recreational area for Aucklanders. The Muriwai R ...

is located just inland.

Name

Young Nick's Head has often been misinterpreted to be the first land sighted by the crew of Captain James Cook's ship, '' Endeavour'' on Friday 6 October 1769. Cook promised a reward to the first crewman to sight land and this reward was delivered to 12-year-old Nicholas Young, assistant to the ship's surgeon, in the form of two gallons of rum and the name of a prominent landmark. Prior to Cook's arrival, the headland was known to Māori as Te Kuri o Pāoa, which translates to "The Dog of Pāoa". Māori legends recount that Pāoa lost his

dog The dog (''Canis familiaris'' or ''Canis lupus familiaris'') is a domesticated descendant of the wolf. Also called the domestic dog, it is derived from the extinct Pleistocene wolf, and the modern wolf is the dog's nearest living relative. Do ...

in the Poverty Bay area and the dog is still there waiting for his master to return. It is said at dawn the white cliffs resemble the outline of a dog in a crouching position.

Nick's Head Station

Nick's Head Station consists of the headland and its surrounding coastal, wetland and farming areas. The 661 hectare property is currently owned by New York

financier An investor is a person who allocates financial capital with the expectation of a future return (profit) or to gain an advantage (interest). Through this allocated capital most of the time the investor purchases some species of property. Type ...

John Griffin. After acquiring the property in 2002, Griffin engaged in a long-term plan to restore the area's vegetation and wildlife. Across the station over 600,000 trees were planted, 26 hectares of wetlands were restored, and a 2-metre-high predator-proof fence was constructed as native species such as

Tuatara Tuatara (''Sphenodon punctatus'') are reptiles endemic to New Zealand. Despite their close resemblance to lizards, they are part of a distinct lineage, the order Rhynchocephalia. The name ''tuatara'' is derived from the Māori language and m ...

Blue Penguin The little penguin (''Eudyptula minor'') is a species of penguin from New Zealand. They are commonly known as little blue penguins or blue penguins owing to their slate-blue plumage and are also known by their Māori name . The Australian lit ...

and

Wētā Wētā (also spelt weta) is the common name for a group of about 100 insect species in the families Anostostomatidae and Rhaphidophoridae endemic to New Zealand. They are giant flightless crickets, and some are among the heaviest insects in th ...

were reintroduced. In 2005 Ecoworks, an ecological restoration company in Gisborne, successfully used solar-powered, acoustic-attraction methods and artificial burrows to establish breeding colonies of six

pelagic The pelagic zone consists of the water column of the open ocean, and can be further divided into regions by depth (as illustrated on the right). The word ''pelagic'' is derived . The pelagic zone can be thought of as an imaginary cylinder or wa ...

seabird species at Young Nick's Head which had previously been severely affected by human colonisation and the introduction of new predators.

Protest of sale (2002)

Nick's Head Station was listed for sale in November 2000. In January 2002, John Griffin entered into a contract to purchase the property for $4 million after an earlier attempt made by the

Ngai Tamanuhiri Ngai (also called Múrungu or Enkai) is the monolithic Supreme Being, Supreme God in the spirituality of the Kikuyu people, Kikuyu (or Gikuyu) and the closely related Embu people, Embu, Meru people, Meru and Kamba people, Kamba groups of Kenya, a ...

iwi Iwi () are the largest social units in New Zealand Māori society. In Māori roughly means "people" or "nation", and is often translated as "tribe", or "a confederation of tribes". The word is both singular and plural in the Māori language, an ...

failed through lack of finance. Protesting against foreign ownership of the culturally and historically significant land, a group of local Māori led by

Tu Wyllie Tutekawa "Tu" Wyllie (born 24 October 1954) is a former New Zealand politician and rugby union player. A first five-eighth, Wyllie represented Wellington at a provincial level, and played one match for the New Zealand national side, the All Blac ...

occupied Young Nick's Head and staged protests at Parliament. After negotiations with iwi took place, then Finance Minister Michael Cullen announced in August 2002 that “Young Nick’s Head will be protected and the cliffs, pā site and peak of Te Kuri gifted into public ownership as part of a purchase deal for Young Nick’s Station”. Griffin also agreed upon purchasing the land to establish an open covenant through the

Queen Elizabeth II National Trust The Queen Elizabeth II National Trust (QEII) is a registered charity and statutory New Zealand organisation independent from the government and managed by a Board of Directors. It was established in 1977 by the Queen Elizabeth the Second Nation ...

to protect the remainder of the headland area from commercial development.

References

{{Gisborne District Headlands of the Gisborne District History of the Gisborne District