VICTORIAN FORESTRY;

Dominion, Volume 18, Issue 180, 24 April 1924, Page 8

VICTORIAN FORESTRY;

NEW ZEALANDER’S CRITICISM REPLY BY COMMISSIONERS Surpise was expressed by members of th© Victorian forestry commission at the criticism of forestry in Australia made by the director of the New Zealand State forest service (Mr. L. M. Ellis). Mr. Ellis passed through Melbourne, but did not call at. the offices of the commission nor visit, any of the plantations and reservations, states the “Argus.” Commissioners cannot understand why he should have made such sweeping criticisms without a thorough inspection. With the exception of the Western district and part of the northern plain, said the commissioners, Victoria had generally good cover and shelter from trees, shrubs, and natural growth. An area of more than 5.000 acres was planted in shelter belts on private land in the Western district, and each year the . commission issued a steadily increasing number of tice plants and shrubs to all districts for shetler mid shade. Ihe output of the State nurseries, was readily used for such denuded districts as South Gippsland, the western plains, the coastal district generally, and part of the northern plains. Replying to other statements by Mr. Ellis/the Commissioners said that for many years past the planting of exotic softwoods had been developed steadily in New Zealand, not without severe criticism from a commission which sat in 1913,; from Sir William Schlich, who carefully reviewed the investigations of that body; and later from the late Sir David Hutchins, who prepared a special report for the New Zealand Government. The chief grounds of the criticisms were not only the excessive planting of doubtful species, such as larch, and the choice of some inferior or unsuitable pines, as well as Australian hardwoods, but the marked, and deliberate neglect of the Dominion’s own indigenous softwoods, such as kauri, totara, white pine, and rimu. Not x>nly had; most of the best forests of these fine timbers been exhausted but large tracts had been thrown open for settlement and wantonly burnt, while there was no forestry system in force for maintaining and improving the yields of the native reserves. The slow growth of the native softwoods gradually induced that, attitude in the public mind, and, it is said, encouraged Ministers and officials to throw overboard in their policy the maintenance of the natural forests, and take up the planting of European and American species of quick growth. At the same time, New Zealand was mainly dependent on durable' Australian liar d woods for? railway engineering works, harbour and jetty works, and telegraphs. Therefore the policy was adopted of planting, not durable timbers such as ironbark, tallowwood, th© grey box group, stringybarks, or even sugar gum, which might have been tested properly in the North Island, but quick-growing timbers such as blue gum, white gum, and Camden woollybutt, all of which, though useful timbers, were commonly less durable in contact with the ground than tho other hardwoods.

New Zealand, at the end of last year,had 44,640 acres under exotic plantations, a very much larger planted area than Australia possessed. Softwood planting was still very backward in the Commonwealth. Only South Australia, Victoria, and, of late, New. South “Wales had made a fair advance in than district. South Australia, naturally a thinly timbered, and in parts, almost treeless State, had to create planted forests at an early stage of settlement, and with a few. species of pine, and sugar gum, despite dryness of climate and irregular rainfall, had laid down some excellent plantations, enclosing more than 25,000 acres. The main plantings in New South Wales were about six years old, but up to last year nearly 5100 acres had been planted. Victoria, followed South Australia, and the area under conifers was now 11,300 acres. For several years the development of pine plantations had been very slight, but now there was a prospect of a largely-increased output from those tree nurseries and of a much larger acreage being planted each year. The main forest wealth of Australia would always be in the great hardwood forests- ail the valuable forests still left to New Zealand were conifers yielding softwood timbers. In Victoria, for many years, th© chief object kept in view had been the development and careful improvement of the stand and acreage-yield of the forests of natural hardwoods. The greatly-increased yields in revenue from that source enabled the commission to carry on its general operations of improvement Sellings and the regular treatment of large tracts of young pole and spar forest, and also its annual plantings and sowings of both pine and hardwood. The planting of softwoods in Victoria was inadequate for the needs of the future, and must be greatly extended and increased.