à Âtari-Wilton's Bush is a native botanic garden and forest reserve located in the suburb Wilton of Wellington, New Zealand. It is New Zealand's only public botanic garden dedicated solely to the native plants of New Zealand. The reserve includes of native forest, and of plant collections. The first section of what would become à Âtari-Wilton's Bush was purchased in 1906 by the government and designated as a scenic reserve. The first director of the reserve was botanist Leonard Cockayne, who alongside John Gretton Mackenzie established the Otari Open-Air Native Plant Museum in 1926. The forest in the reserve contains some of the oldest trees in Wellington, including an 800-year-old rimu. The reserve holds a broad range of plants, with one bioblitz recording nearly 500 species of vascular plants, liverworts, mosses and lichens. In addition to its extensive flora, the reserve also hosts a wide range of fauna, including notable species such as ornate skink (Oligosoma ornatum), longfin eel (Anguilla dieffenbachii) and glowworm (Arachnocampa luminosa). The reserve undergoes regular pest control to minimise the effects of invasive mammalian predators such as possums and rats. Due to its diverse plant collection and reserve biodiversity, scientific research is regularly conducted at à Âtari-Wilton. à Âtari-Wilton's Bush is owned and managed by Wellington City Council and is supported by the à Âtari-Wilton's Bush Trust.
The original forest in the area surrounding à Âtari-Wilton's Bush was a podocarp broadleaf forest. The area was known and used by successive iwi as a good place to gather food and catch prey, and this gives rise to the MÃÂori name "à ÂtarikÃÂkÃÂ" (âÂÂplace of snares to trap kÃÂkÃÂâÂÂ) shortened to "à Âtari". Large trees in the wider area were felled for timber when European settlers arrived in the region, and farms were established.
In 1847 the à Âtari Native Reserve was a block of unsurveyed land between Kaiwharawhara and the Makara valley that was set aside to enable the Crown to offer land swaps to local MÃÂori in exchange for pàsites at Kaiwharawhara, à ÂwhÃÂriu and Pipitea. From the 1850s there was a rapid decline in the MÃÂori population in Wellington.
Settler Job Wilton arrived in Wellington in 1841 as a seven year old boy. He married Ellen Curtis in Wellington in 1860, and they purchased in the Kaiwharawhara valley. Wilton had been concerned about the large-scale land clearance around Wellington in the 1840s and 50s and the loss of native forest. He set aside of untouched forest near his homestead, and fenced it to protect it from stock. This became known as WiltonâÂÂs Bush, and was a popular area for picnickers and day trippers.
In 1902, the MÃÂori owners of a block of native forest in the à Âtari Native Reserve wished to lease their land, and this raised concerns that the forest would be cleared. A deputation including Job Wilton, two mayors, and three members of Parliament met with the Minister of Lands to ask for steps to preserve the land for the benefit of the public. The New Zealand Times supported the proposal, describing Wilton's Bush as:
In 1906 the government bought of land in the à Âtari Native Reserve from its MÃÂori owners and designated it as a scenic reserve, naming it à Âtari-Wilton's Bush Scenic Reserve. The land was later transferred to Wellington City Council in 1918 for âÂÂrecreation purposes and for the preservation of native floraâÂÂ. In 1918, John Gretton Mackenzie was appointed as the new Director of Parks and Reserves for Wellington. When Mackenzie commenced in October that year, he immediately put a stop to cattle grazing in the reserve, noting that grazing removes undergrowth and allows wind to pass through the forest. By 1920, new paths had been created through the reserve. By 1926, the site was known as the Otari Open-Air Native Plant Museum. The first director of the reserve was Leonard Cockayne. In the 1920s he worked with John Gretton MacKenzie, the director of Wellington Parks and Reserves, on plans for the open-air plant museum. Cockayne formed a rough plan for how the reserve should be structured, focusing on four key aspects that encapsulate plant life in New Zealand:
In 1928, the eminent botanist Arthur William Hill, director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, visited à Âtari while on a trip to New Zealand and even went on botanical trips with Cockayne. The name of the reserve was changed to à Âtari Native Botanic Garden in 1991, then à Âtari-Wilton's Bush Native Botanic Garden and Forest Reserve in 1999, before finally being renamed à Âtari-WiltonâÂÂs Bush in 2000, recognising the influences of both MÃÂori and Europeans.
The Troup Picnic area adjacent to the Kaiwharawhara Stream was named in honour of George Troup, a distinguished architect and 23rd mayor of Wellington.
The forest at à Âtari-Wilton's Bush covers around of the catchment area of the northeast flowing Kaiwharawhara Stream. The area includes several gullies and side streams, some with small waterfalls, and is surrounded by hills up to 280 m above sea level. The underlying rock is Greywacke, and the vegetation includes original podocarp broadleaf forest, semi-coastal kohekohe (Didymocheton spectabilis) forest and regenerating forest and scrub. Larger trees in the forest include podocarps such as mataë (Prumnopitys taxifolia), miro (Prumnopitys ferruginea), tà Âtara (Podocarpus totara) and rimu (Dacrydium cupressinum). The forest contains some of the oldest trees in Wellington, examples of which can be seen from the canopy walkway. One notable example of these trees is an 800-year-old rimu named "Moko". The tree is around high, wide and has a crown spread of . At the base of the tree is a platform that was constructed in 2019 to protect the tree and enable viewing of it.
The larger trees will often have perching plants (epiphytes) in higher branches. Climbing plants are also common throughout, including supplejack (Ripogonum), New Zealand passionfruit (Passiflora tetrandra), and several species of rata (Metrosideros). On the upper slopes, the predominant trees are mÃÂhoe (Melicytus ramiflorus), rewarewa (Knightia excelsa), tawa (Beilschmiedia tawa) and kohekohe, with some forest remnants of matai and rimu. In damp areas, there are pukatea (Laurelia novae-zelandiae) that typically have large plank buttress roots to support their growth.
The high south-facing slopes in the reserve are covered in regenerating scrub that is dominated by introduced plants such as gorse (Ulex europaeus) and Darwin's barberry (Berberis darwinii), although native plants such as rangiora (Brachyglottis repanda) and mÃÂhoe can also be found.
In 2007, a BioBlitz was held to "increase public awareness and to generate scientific knowledge" of the biodiversity within à Âtari-Wilton's Bush in celebration of its one hundred year anniversary. Nearly 500 species of vascular plants, liverworts, mosses and lichens were recorded during the 24 hours of the BioBlitz including a number of new records, such as the flowering plant Veronica javanica and the liverwort Marchantia polymorpha subsp. ruderalis.
Possums were introduced to the Wellington region in the 1880s and have since devastated the environment by feeding on native plants and animals. In 1928, Leonard Cockayne began a possum control program at à Âtari-Wilton to limit their impact. This program continued for decades, but in the 1990s it was determined that there were still twelve possums per hectare in the reserve. In response to this, the Greater Wellington Regional Council began intensively poisoning possums with cyanide traps in 1993, killing over 800 of them. After this, hockey-stick bait stations filled with poison were installed throughout the reserve and possums are now rarely seen. Other mammalian pests such as rats and mustelids are also targeted with traps. To combat these pests, the à Âtari-Wilton's Bush Trust was gifted DOC200 predator traps, which were laid out through areas of the reserve and are maintained by volunteers.
The native plant collections at à Âtari-Wilton's Bush contain about 1,200 species, including hybrids and cultivars representing plants from mainland New Zealand and off-shore islands. The plants on display have generally been raised from seeds or cuttings collected from their original environments. The four main objectives of the collection are:
The plants are arranged in distinct collections, including an alpine garden, a fernery, hebe and flax cultivars, a large rock garden, grass and sedge species, and a coastal garden. A detailed and interactive online map of the gardens published by the Wellington City Council provides the location of each collection, and a list of the plants that can be found in that section of the gardens.
Initially, two kauri (Agathis australis) saplings were first planted at à Âtari in 1926 at the entrance. An area of land on a hill was cleared of gorse and bracken (Pteridium esculentum) to make way for kauri plantings, but potatoes had to be planted first to clean the soil of gorse seeds. In this cleared section, plantings occurred in the 1930s forming the "Kauri Grove". This was done for two reasons: firstly it was to prove that native trees could easily be grown for timber and secondly to create a representative ecotype of North Island kauri groves. Despite farm animals and hares damaging many of the saplings and gorse encroaching on the grove, more kauri were planted in the 1950s. As of 2010, 160 kauri trees were still present but are not thought to be regenerating.
In April 2019, a report by Statistics New Zealand on the conservation status of indigenous land species identified species classified as threatened with or at risk of extinction. For vascular plants, a total of 1,253 species were identified (representing 46 percent of known species). Human settlement has caused many plants to disappear from New Zealand's forests, wetlands and coasts. Major losses are blamed on industries such as agriculture and forestry, and the introduction of animal pests and invasive weeds.
The Native Botanic Gardens at à Âtari-Wilton's Bush include many New Zealand plants that are threatened in the wild. Some of these plants are raised and either kept at à Âtari-Wilton's Bush as a conservation measure, or returned to original habitats as part of plant conservation recovery programmes. One example of plant conservation work at à Âtari-Wilton's bush is the planting of seeds of New ZealandâÂÂs only fully parasitic flowering plant, Dactylanthus taylori (Te Pua o te RÃÂinga) that were translocated from Pureora forest in 2020.
A wide range of organisations work in partnership with à Âtari-Wilton's Bush on plant conservation, including the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa, Victoria University of Wellington, the Department of Conservation and Plant & Food Research.
A number of scientific research studies have been conducted within à Âtari-Wilton's Bush regarding biodiversity. These include multi-year ecological studies on epiphyte diversity and distribution, masting in the kohekohe tree, and changes in tree abundance over time. After receiving $72,000 of funding from the Lions Club of Karori, in 2018, the Lions à Âtari Plant Conservation Laboratory was opened and with it a major research focus on seed germination, long-term storage of seeds, and cryopreservation of seeds of native New Zealand plants, especially in the myrtle family and orchids. The Lions à Âtari Plant Conservation Laboratory has been an important component in several research projects studying the relationship between multiple threatened New Zealand orchids and their mycorrhizal fungal partners. These studies have been collaborations between à Âtari researchers Karin van der Walt and Jennifer Alderton-Moss with Te Papa botanist Carlos Lehnebach and others.
For example, research in the laboratory was critical to understand the nutrients and mycorrhizal fungal partners needed to germinate seeds of the onion orchids Microtis oligantha and M. unifolia. In that study and others, a closely-related non-threatened species (such as M. unifolia) is studied as a proxy to learn or perfect techniques that can be used on the threatened species (such as M. oligantha). In another study, researchers propagated individuals of the greenhood species Pterostylis montana and P. paludosa in the lab using in vitro plant tissue culture (also called asymbiotic germination) as a pathway to restore threatened populations with the resulting seedlings.
Work in the lab is also contributing to identifying the mycorrhizal fungal hyphae of spider orchids in the genus Corybas (including the threatened swamp helmet orchid Corybas carsei) by culturing their fungi in the lab and later sequencing their DNA.
In 2022, to support the work of the Plant Conservation Laboratory, à Âtari received a grant from Te Tahua Taiao Nga Taonga Lotteries Environment and Heritage Fund specifically for developing propagation methods for restoration and ex situ conservation of New Zealand orchids. In 2025, seedlings of Cooper's black potato orchid (Gastrodia cooperae) that were reared in the Lions à Âtari Plant Conservation Laboratory were planted in the wild population at the type locality for that species.
A total of 24 species of birds have been recorded from à Âtari-Wilton's Bush. Some of these species include kererà «, tà «Ã«, kingfisher (MÃÂori: kà Âtare), fantail (pëwakawaka), grey warbler (riroriro), silvereye (tauhou) and morepork (ruru). Over 600 species of invertebrates have been recorded from à Âtari-Wilton. Some notable invertebrates include the giraffe weevil (Lasiorhynchus barbicornis), Wellington tree wÃÂtà(Hemideina crassidens) and admiral butterflies (Vanessa). The reserve is also known to support a population of glowworm (Arachnocampha luminosa). It can be found living in moist, vertical banks in some parts of the reserve. The tree trapdoor spider Migas otari is also only known from the bush.
The ngahere gecko Mokopirirakau âÂÂSouthern North Islandâ and the ornate skink (Oligosoma ornatum) are known to occur in the reserve. The latter species is considered to be at risk and is the rarest skink in Wellington City reserves. Kaiwharawhara Stream, which runs through à Âtari-Wilton, supports a range of native fish such as longfin eel (Anguilla dieffenbachii), banded kà Âkopu (Galaxias fasciatus), bluegill bully (Gobiomorphus hubbsi) and kà Âaro (Galaxias brevipinnis). A fish ladder was constructed in 2006 downstream of à Âtari-Wilton to allow fish to more easily move to and from à Âtari-Wilton, as well as other areas. The freshwater crayfish koura (Paranephrops) is also known to occur in the stream. Introduced mammal pests such as rats and mustelids are known to occur in à Âtari-Wilton, but monitoring efforts suggest that they are present in very low numbers. Extensive predator trapping occurs in à Âtari-Wilton and surrounding areas to keep pest populations such as these low.
The Visitor Centre provides information about New Zealand's flora, fauna, and à Âtari-Wilton's Bush. It is open 8amâÂÂ4pm daily. In December 2021, the Visitor Centre was reopened after a two month closure for renovations, and was renamed: 'TÃÂne Whakapiripiri', with the name meaning âÂÂTÃÂne who draws people togetherâÂÂ. There are displays and information for visiting groups, and a small lecture room that is available for educational purposes. The Leonard Cockayne Centre, which was formally the curator's house, is a seminar and function room located in a stand-alone building adjacent to the Leonard Cockayne memorial lawn. At the entrance of à Âtari is a wooden carved gateway (waharoa), with carvings of TÃÂne Mahuta (to represent respect for nature), kararehe (representing insects and other animals) and ngàmanu (representing birds). A 75-metre-long canopy walkway, beginning at the Information Centre, links the two main garden areas by wooden bridge. It is 18 metres above the ground and stream below.
There are walks and trails within the forest and gardens to suit a range of ages and abilities. Good walking footwear and appropriate clothing for the weather conditions is recommended.
In September 2025, Taranaki WhÃÂnui ki Te Upoko o Te Ika, who are mana whenua for à Âtari, gifted new names in te reo MÃÂori for the walking tracks within à Âtari. Collectively, this new wayfinding experience is called Ngàara o à Âtari, and individually the tracks are named as follows:
The gardens are located at 160 Wilton Road, approximately 5 km from the city centre. Public transport to the gardens is available via the No 14 Wilton bus route from the city centre. There are also car parks at the Wilton Road and Churchill Drive entrances. There is a path suitable for wheelchairs from Wilton Road to the Visitor Centre, and from there to the Cockayne Lookout via the Canopy Walkway. There is also an accessible path along the Kaiwharawhara Stream from the carpark off Churchill Drive to the Troup Picnic Lawn. The gardens are open daily between sunrise and sunset, and entry is free.
à Âtari-Wilton's Bush is classified by the New Zealand Gardens Trust as a 6Star rated Garden of International Significance. It is also one of the Founding Gardens of the Trust. à Âtari-WiltonâÂÂs Bush has also received an international Green Flag Award that recognises and rewards well-managed parks and green spaces and around the world.
The à Âtari-Wilton's Bush Trust was formed as a registered Charitable Trust in 2001. The trust deed registered with the application describes the principal purpose of the trust as: "To educate the local and wider community in New Zealand flora, thereby fostering public awareness and appreciation of native plants and of the environmental importance of their protection, conservation and rehabilitation and promoting the unique botanic diversity of à Âtari-WiltonâÂÂs Bush". The trust is a member of the New Zealand Plant Conservation Network. One of the founding trustees was the renowned New Zealand botanist John Dawson.
Although à Âtari-Wilton's Bush is owned and managed by the Wellington City Council, the à Âtari-Wilton's Bush Trust has a significant role in supporting the objectives of the gardens, via education programmes, marketing initiatives and hands-on volunteering.