Restoring Sealife is an early-stage New Zealand initiative working to turn bare seawalls into habitat and to show what changes when monitoring is built in from the start. We're building it to work alongside iwi, scientists, councils and coastal partners as projects develop.
Across Aotearoa, our harbours and marinas are edged with smooth concrete and steel - seawalls, pilings, and breakwaters that provide almost zero ecological habitat. Where natural rocky shores once teemed with life, engineered surfaces offer nothing for marine species to cling to, shelter in, or feed from.
The Hauraki Gulf / Tīkapa Moana is facing depleted shellfish beds, disappearing seagrass meadows, and reefs overrun with kina - the result of overfishing, sedimentation, and the compounding effects of climate change. The Hauraki Gulf Forum's State of Our Gulf 2023 report describes continued ecological collapse across the marine park.
The Hauraki Gulf / Tīkapa Moana Marine Protection Act 2025, which came into force on 25 October 2025, establishes 19 new protected areas - two marine reserve extensions, 12 high protection areas, and five seafloor protection areas - and grows marine protection in the Gulf from 0.3% to 5.9% of its area.
Restoring Sealife focuses on retrofitting modular habitat onto existing coastal infrastructure and making the monitoring legible to the public. Third-party precedent work in Tauranga used Living Seawall Boulder products developed by Reef Design Lab and the Sydney Institute of Marine Science.
Habitat surfaces can add rock-pool texture and shelter to otherwise smooth coastal structures, with monitoring used to test what returns.
Habitat modules bolt directly onto existing seawalls, pilings, and breakwaters. No new construction needed - we work with the infrastructure that's already there.
Tauranga Harbour provides an external New Zealand precedent, with 100 installed habitat modules and observed taxa including glass shrimp, cushion stars, bryozoans, ascidians, and triplefin fish.
Aotearoa's coasts are increasingly engineered, but hard infrastructure does not have to stay ecologically empty. Restoring Sealife exists to help coastal partners retrofit habitat into existing structures, translate monitoring into public understanding, and build restoration projects that are locally grounded, evidence-led, and transparent about what is still being tested.
Here's how a Restoring Sealife project is designed to work - with us coordinating, and specialist partners doing the technical work.
Bring iwi, councils, marine scientists, and site owners together to choose priority sites - places where added habitat can do the most ecological good.
Work with the technology and engineering partners who design and manufacture the habitat modules, so each configuration suits the site's tidal range, wave exposure, and target species.
Coordinate the delivery partners and site owners who fit the modules onto existing seawalls, pilings, and breakwaters - retrofitting habitat with no new construction.
Work with research partners and the community to track what returns through scientific monitoring and citizen science - and make the results something the public can follow.
Not every site shown here is at the same stage. Some are under active discussion, and some are future opportunities. We label each one clearly so visitors can see what is built, what is being monitored, and what is still at feasibility stage.
Part of a speculative project pipeline. Public sources do not yet confirm project status, partners, or commitments. Not a confirmed project yet
Part of a speculative project pipeline. Public sources do not yet confirm project status, partners, or commitments. Not a confirmed project yet
Whether you're a marine scientist, a community group, a coastal landowner, or someone who cares about our oceans - we'd love to hear from you. Sign up for updates as the project develops.
No spam. Updates only when there's something worth sharing.