Restoring Sealife works to turn seawalls, pilings and other hard coastal infrastructure into habitat for marine life, bringing together mana whenua, councils, ports, scientists and community groups who share that goal.
The Tauranga project was delivered by others. It is included here as New Zealand precedent; Restoring Sealife was not involved in its delivery.
Across Aotearoa, harbours, marinas and urban shores are increasingly edged with seawalls, pilings and breakwaters. These smooth concrete and steel surfaces give marine life little to attach to, shelter in or feed from. Where rocky shores once supported rich intertidal life, engineered edges often hold very little.
Intertidal life is also under pressure from sedimentation, overharvesting, pollution and a changing climate. Communities around the country are noticing, and many are organising to protect what remains.
The Hauraki Gulf / Tīkapa Moana shows both the pressure and the response. Its shellfish beds and seagrass meadows have declined, with overfishing, sedimentation and climate change all contributing. The Hauraki Gulf Forum's State of our Gulf 2026 report, the first published since the Marine Protection Act 2025, finds the Gulf improving in places but still under significant pressure from sedimentation, plastic pollution and overfishing.
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. DOC's figure describes marine reserves and high protection areas growing from 0.3% to 5.9% of the Gulf's area; this does not describe all 19 areas combined, and it is not a site-specific consent determination for any Restoring Sealife activity.
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 attach to existing seawalls, pilings and breakwaters rather than requiring new structures to be built. Suitability, attachment method, loads, materials and any required approvals depend on the specific site and design.
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.
Our vision: a New Zealand coastline where built structures support marine life rather than displace it.
Established organisations already restore dunes, mussel reefs, seagrass, kelp and marine reserves. Restoring Sealife adds to that work by focusing on seawalls and other hard infrastructure in the intertidal zone, and by connecting the people already working on these coastlines.
This is our intended pathway. A project would proceed only when the relevant assessments, relationships, permissions and resources are in place.
Start with mana whenua, then bring councils, marine scientists and site owners together to understand the opportunity and choose priority sites where added habitat can do the most ecological good.
Seek site-specific ecological and engineering advice, consider alternatives, and decide whether enhancement is appropriate.
Develop a proposal with the people involved: the habitat approach, maintenance responsibilities and monitoring plan.
Establish the relevant permissions, consent requirements, biosecurity measures, funding and installation arrangements.
If the project can proceed, use suitably qualified people to deliver the agreed design safely.
Work with research partners, hapū and the community to track what returns through scientific monitoring and citizen science, with data arrangements agreed with mana whenua from the start, and share results in a form the public can follow.
Restoring habitat on built coastlines takes people who don't usually sit at the same table. Our role is to bring them together and keep the work moving.
Mana whenua come first. We seek engagement with iwi and hapū at the design stage of any project, before sites or products are chosen. Monitoring data and mātauranga shared through a project stay under the control of those who hold them, under agreements made at the start.
Get in touch →Seawalls, wharves and breakwaters are already maintained and renewed. We help councils and asset owners add habitat as part of that work, and coordinate the specialists needed to do it.
Get in touch →Ports and marinas manage some of the most engineered shorelines in the country. A habitat retrofit gives them a visible, monitored contribution to marine life on infrastructure they already own.
Get in touch →We work to connect each site with research partners, so monitoring is designed properly from the start and results are shared in a form the public can follow.
Get in touch →Local groups already watch, protect and monitor their coastlines. We want to connect that knowledge and energy with restoration projects, and with each other.
Get in touch →Every project needs support for habitat modules, installation and monitoring. We can share what a pilot involves and exactly where support would go.
Get in touch →People caring for coastlines are working in parallel all over Aotearoa: rockpool protectors, marine reserve volunteers, dive clubs, schools, researchers and hapū monitoring teams. Many are working through the same questions without knowing about each other.
Restoring Sealife aims to help connect them: sharing what's working, linking local monitoring with research, and making it easier for each new site to learn from the ones before it.
What works at one site, and what doesn't, is recorded and shared with the next.
A common monitoring approach so results can be compared between sites, with data arrangements agreed locally.
We aim to build paid local roles in monitoring and delivery into projects where funding allows.
Part of a group working on your coast? We'd like to hear what you're doing and what you've learned.
Tell us about your groupRestoring Sealife is at feasibility stage. We are working toward a first pilot and will name pilot sites publicly once mana whenua and site owners have been engaged.
100 habitat modules installed in Tauranga Harbour, with University of Waikato monitoring since May 2024. Restoring Sealife was not involved in delivering this project; we are learning from it.
We are assessing options for a first pilot, starting small so results can be monitored properly before anything grows. Sites will be chosen with mana whenua, site owners and research partners. A promising starting point includes: an asset owner willing to explore the idea; early engagement with mana whenua and local communities; suitable ecological and physical conditions; safe access for installation, maintenance and monitoring; and a realistic pathway for permissions, resourcing and long-term care.
Suggest a siteRestoring Sealife is run by a small team of marine conservation volunteers. We're keeping this page simple while the team is being assembled — get in touch if you'd like to know more.
Get in touch →Become a founding supporter of a community-sponsored pilot. Contributions will go toward the first pilot installation: seapods (habitat modules), installation, and the monitoring that shows what comes back. Every adopted seapod is recorded in a supporter registry, and adopters receive updates as their pod moves from order to installation to first monitoring results. Monitoring updates will be shared in line with data arrangements agreed with mana whenua for the site. If plans change, we'll tell you exactly what happened and where your contribution went.
Sponsor one seapod. Your name (or a name you choose) in the supporter registry, plus installation and monitoring updates for your pod.
Sponsor a cluster of five seapods - enough to create a connected patch of habitat. Registry recognition for your family, group, or business.
Partner with us on a whole installation - shoreside recognition, monitoring reports for your organisation, and a story your people can stand behind.
Adoption is not open yet. When it opens, a contribution goes toward the first pilot installation; it is not a purchase of a physical product. Pods are installed on coastal infrastructure and stay in the sea where they belong.
Whether you look after a coastline, own infrastructure on one, study it or simply care about it, we'd like to hear from you. Choose what best describes you below, or just tell us in your own words.
You can also follow our progress on Facebook.