Okarito Forest

Press, Volume CXVI, Issue 34089, 28 February 1976, Page 14

Okarito Forest

Sir, — Perhaps a more honest phrase to describe selective or partial logging would be “thinning to extinction.” —Yours, etc., B. SMITH. February 26, 1976.

1 Sir, —As the Forest Serjvice has no idea whether or I not rimu will regenerate, how can it possibly estimate the success of its “sustained yield method” of logging? 1 understand the service has only been attempting this method with rimu the last ;two years, yet only the next 150 to 200 years will tell the ; story, probably too late. Is I the service so blind thinking 'that the felling of “over-: .mature” trees (mentioned as “hollow, rotten.” and “malformed") will not disturb the ecosystem of the natural, forest floor? Does it really! feel a mere 200 m strip' surrounding the lagoon will 'stop its silting as logs are dragged through catchment streams changing ecosystem of the white heron? I totally abhor the concept, or reality, of logging Okarito State Forest. As pointed out, it is the last major source of rimu in the 'world, which is all the more treason why not one tree

should be felled. — Yours, etc.,

ELSA BUCHANAN. February 27, 1976.