Mexteds' unique Hurrishifter equipment has been in demand from schools and council staff when erecting rugby posts, with the spotlight now firmly on minimising risk under new Health & Safety At Work legislation.

Chris Parkinson, our Operations Manager, watched the dawn rise over Mt Taranaki, ahead of a day's work doing wicket renovations for the New Plymouth District Council.

First stop was Pukekura Park, where he verticut and grooved to prepare the wickets for topdressing and re-sowing, before doing the same for seven club blocks around New Plymouth and Inglewood.  

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​Minimising the risk of bird strike has seen Mexteds working the night shift to establish 1.7 hectares of AVANEX turf next to the runways at Wellington airport.
The deterrent properties of the grass are provided by novel endophytic fungi in the plant that are repellent to insects and the majority of fungal diseases.
The specialised grass seed has been developed by Grasslands, a commercial arm of New Zealand’s AgResearch. Mexteds has worked on the project with Sports Surface Design and Management (SSDM), an accredited consultancy for AVANEX.
SSDM sports turf consultant, Will Bowden, says Mexteds’ specialist equipment and knowledge were key factors in its selection as the contractor of choice.
While the AVANEX seed itself is not difficult to establish, the environment where it is used is challenging, and the turf will require ongoing maintenance once established.
“Airports tend to have heavy soil, are windy, have no irrigation and no turf specialists on site, so they are the challenges.”
The work must also be carried out at night when planes aren’t flying, for safety reasons.
The contract involves a double spray off of the area to be re-seeded, verti-sweeping to scarify the soil while minimising dust, an application of pre-seed fertiliser and then drilling of the seed.
A temporary irrigation system ensures the grass is established over summer.
A small area of AVANEX was established at the airport last year, and has already proved its value in terms of a fewer birds.
​The programme to convert all the turf at Wellington airport to AVANEX is expected to continue for a number of years, according to Bowden.

Water pooling on the back straight at the Otaki Maori Racing Club saw Mexteds contracted to install 750 metres of 160mm collector drains recently. Race Group Tracks Manager, Kim Treweek, says the club decided to replace some of the older catchment. “It wasn’t working well. The water wasn’t getting away.”

The club decided to take a staged approach, installing new collector drains first to see what difference that would make, and at the same time installing junctions so that if in future they wish to extend the drainage they can plug straight into it. Kim says the collector drains are doing the job.

“It’s looking fantastic, even with the rain we’ve had to date, which has been a reasonable amount, it’s going really well.” While Mexteds was installing the collector drains, the area continued to be used for morning training, and racing continued outside the works area.

​"The day to day work and tidy up at the end of the night for horse training the next day was fantastic,” says Kim. “It was clean and tidy and nothing was left around that would impact on the training.” 

At times it’s been all hands to the pump as Mexteds has undertaken a significant upgrade of the Hutt Recreation Ground for the Hutt City Council over recent months. 

The #2 and #3 fields have been upgraded to full sand surfaces, following the installation of primary and secondary drainage and irrigation systems. 

In the first stage, Mexteds installed 171 metres of 160mm collector drains and 3,510 metres of 110mm subsoil lateral drains on both fields, and undertook some minor levelling of the #3 field over a 120 metre by 70 metre area.

At the end of the cricket season, secondary drainage work began, with 50mm sand slits installed at one metre centres, followed by 10mm sand top dressing. The final part of the project was the installation of a new cricket wicket.

We excavated a new block, installed subsoil drainage, basecourse and topcourse, before laying and laser levelling the new Patamahoe clay wicket. The old block was reinstated, sowed and fertilised and levels readjusted to blend in the new block and surrounding outfield area, using trenchings from the drainage works.

​Paul Pinfold, our contracts manager, said the work progressed well and has now been completed, despite a short hold up to final sand slitting and sand top dressing when the Wellington Phoenix relocated to Hutt Rec from the Westpac Stadium during the International Cricket World Cup.