Ianthe logging experiments disastrous for forest?

Press, 5 September 1987, Page 18

Ianthe logging experiments disastrous for forest?

“Country Calendar” spent a week with three gangs of bushmen felling in lanthe Forest, half way between the small South Westland towns of Ross and Harihari. lanthe Forest covers 14,00$ hectares and has been already worked over, first by the giant mill company Stuart and Chapman, and, for the past 18 years, by the Forest Service. The bushmen say the Forest Service has used the block as something of a guinea pig, trying out a number of logging techniques like strip-felling and selective felling (taking out just the big rlmu).

They say the expert-

ments have been disastrous and blame this on the lack of expertise of the forest service, a lack of consultation with the bushmen themselves, and on trying to please both th environmentalists and the mills.

There are now just 1100 hectares left to be clear-felled, and about 25 per cent of this will be unusable because of the damage inflicted on the smaller rimu when the larger trees were taken ouL

The bushmen say their own days are numbered — the pressure of environmentalists to halt all native-tree-felling, the falling demand for

timber because of the building recession, and the dwindling native reserves add up to an uncertain future.

“Country Calendar,” tomorrow (Sunday) at 6.05 p.m. on One looks at the life of a bushie through the daily routines of three gangs and three men — Percy Singer, Kevin Foster and Rusty Stuart. All come from West Coast families with the bush in their blood.' All have strong opinions on how the forest should have been managed, how the “Greenies” should stay out of the Coasters’ lives, and how the rest of the country has treated the West Coast.