Hakarimata Range is a range of hills on the western edge of Ngāruawāhia township, in the Waikato region of New Zealand, overlooking the confluence of the Waikato and Waipā Rivers. The Hakarimata Range is separated from the Taupiri Range by the Taupiri Gorge, through which the Waikato River flows. After the invasion of the Waikato, parts of the Hakarimatas were confiscated in 1864. of native forest on the range are protected as a scenic reserve. A council supported community group, the Hakarimata Restoration Trust, created in 2001, is helping care for the range. Location Although now usually applied to the hills immediately west of Ngāruawāhia, maps such as Hochstetter's of 1859, the 1925 geology map and 1944 one inch map show 'Hakarimata Range' as extending south to what is now SH23. Similarly, old accounts describe the Whatawhata-Raglan road as passing over the Hakarimatas. Name Hakarimata's name derives from a 17th-century feast, when Ngāti Maniapoto joined the localWaikatos to celebrate the birth of a child. There was a mountain of raw forest foods; hence the name Hākari-kai-mata (uncooked food mountain), condensed to Hakarimata. Geology Hakarimata is part of the roughly north - south Kawhia Syncline (Taupiri to the north, Kapamahunga to the south), though the Hakarimata Anticline is at about a 30° angle to the rest of the syncline, probably due to strike slip movement along the Waipa Fault, Late Triassic Newcastle Group, sandstones, siltstones and greywacke have been folded, faulted and covered by other sedimentary rocks to form the Hakarimatas. Flora and fauna Plants Hakarimata is the largest remnant of broadleaf-podocarp lowland forest that once dominated the Waikato. It is near the southern limit of kauri forest and northern limit of beech forest, with plants and animals of all three forest types. Occasional large rata and rimu stand above the canopy of tawa, kohekohe, hinau, rewarewa, mangeao and pukatea. There are also some miro, Hall's totara and tanekaha. The reserve also contains several threatened plants including Alseuosmia quercifolia, or topara, which is strongly scented in spring. Animals Tūī, kererū, pīwakawaka, pīpīwharauroa, kārearea, pekapeka, copper skink, Auckland green gecko and peripatus are among the species in the bush. 16 species of native fish include short and longfinned eels and banded, short-jaw and giant, kōkopu. In 1995/96, to connect the Hakarimata tree canopy with the Waikato River, and thus encourage indigenous fish, three Waikato tributaries had of fences, 12 stock-water troughs, 5