Manuka Place

Mānuka is the name of an Aussie Rules footy team in Canberra, the national capital of the West Island. It is very unlikely that this is the source of the name of the New Plymouth road, Mānuka Place.

A much more likely origin for the street name is the New Zealand Mānuka tree (Leptospernum scoparium) widely called the tea tree. It got this name when James Cook, sea captain and surveyor, used it to make a nice cup of tea. Cook gave the brew to his crew to combat scurvy.

To prevent scurvy, it is necessary to include foods high in vitamin C in the diet. So Cook fed his men limes where these where available. The tea tree brew was an attempt to find a local substitute. Leaves can be picked at any time of year.

Andrew Crowe, who harvests wild food, has also used a James Cook recipe for making beer from mānuka.

Thickets of mānuka can be found on sand, clay or rock, rolling hills, swamps and bogs even highly infertile serpentine mineral belts. In fact few plant communities in New Zealand, from sea level to sub-alpine, are without mānuka. Botanist Frank Newhook, writing in 1982, referred to mānuka as a "universal aunt" for its service as a nursemaid tree. It forms extensive areas of scrub that protect regenerating forest seedlings and provide shelter for native orchids and other small plants

The wood is red-coloured, and is hard and durable. It has been used for fence posts and for tool handles. It is still much prized as firewood, burning with a fierce heat.

More recently the benefits of mānuka honey and other derivatives have been recognised. Mānuka oil has a strong action as a bactericide and fungicide. This makes it useful for the treatment of a range of skin conditions as well as insect bites and stings, and aching muscles and joints. Used in aromatherapy, it is claimed to calm an oversensitive nervous system.

This story was originally published in the Taranaki Daily News.