Greg Pickford’s love of the outdoors and concerns for the environment have driven a long list of community and conservation projects over the past 50 years, earning him an Outstanding Community Service Award.
The 78-year-old, along with wife and “partner in crime”, Alison, consider themselves “active relaxers” who are “not good at sitting down”. That mindset has led to them becoming involved in projects close to their hearts.
For many years, Greg has helped maintain walking tracks in the Richmond hills and tend trapping lines - and he says one thing led to another.
“I met Keep Richmond Beautiful people and, the next thing you know, you are president. It has working bees every Wednesday and gets between 10 and 17 people who are mostly retired.”
A keen mountainbiker before the sport became mainstream, Greg rode the roads around Richmond hill with a group of friends and saw an opportunity.
“We thought, maybe if we build a little track, we’d have a bit of fun. It took us a couple of hundred hours to build this track and looking back, it was a bit too steep!”
Alongside beautifying Richmond, Greg has spent 15 years on native bird recovery, building hundreds of trap boxes and volunteering for trapping, weeding and planting. He has been involved with Friends of Flora through monthly patrols and served as a line leader for the Mt Hodder trapline. He is also a member of Friends of Snowden’s Bush where he is a key contributor to planning, fundraising and organising working bees.
A lifelong caver, Greg has led trips and explored and mapped new cave systems, which led to his longstanding involvement with search and rescue. In the 1980s, he became the first cave search and rescue advisor for the Nelson area and held the role for 40 years. Today, the pair are part of a small group that feeds up to 120 people for three days during search and rescue exercises on Mt Arthur, and continue to be enthusiastic cavers.
“The caves in Nelson are world famous – there’s hundreds of kilometres of caves.”
Before technology took over, Greg also maintained the mountain radio service, which was once the only source of communication in the area. He says the service saved numerous lives over the years.
At the awards presentation, Greg was described as someone whose passion and commitment have left an incredible mark on both the environment and community.
Greg was one of nine recipients, along with Malcolm McConochie from Rotoiti, Chris Hickson, Colin Hooker, Mary Nicholls, and Jim Fry, all from Motueka, Carol Fowler, Riwaka, Cheryl Elsey, Tākaka and Bevan Langmuir, Collingwood.
