AN URGENT NEED.

Evening Post, Volume LXXV, Issue 29, 4 February 1908, Page 3

AN URGENT NEED.

STATE DEPARTMENT OS 1 1 FOEESTRY. TO THE EDJTO&. Sir,— ln 'last night's iesuo of your paper there appeared an advertisement- by the Victorian Government calling for applications for the position, of "Conservator of Foroots." I ,am oi opinion that unless our Government speectfly adopts the came couise, the generation of thirty jears hor.ee will curse that of to-day for the wanton destruction of our forests and tP o thoughtless improvidence for tho future. It - has already been freely said that much of the vaunted Wairaurino forest will disappear before tho settler's axe, and not before the sawmillers ; and thus ths depletion of our forests is not wholly io be abcribcd to sawmiller?, as is bo often made out The fact rpmaiiiF that it is high time a thorough system of contfenation of all our timber?, whether in eawmillorV or settlors' rights, should be taken in baud by a Branch of Foicstry under Government control. In conserving cur remaining timbers care should bo taken that suitable areas only aro cut, ti>al ail lands bearing etanding bush should be under tho jurisdiction of tht< Forestry Depaitment, which alor.e shall say how, when, nnd at what rate the areas should be cut. down. A thorough system of bush firo protection should bo an ereential of the department, and fires should be lighted onlj at right times and in such manner as a permit would allow. Tho firo police attached to the United States Branches of Forestry have been wonderfully successful in minimising of late years the great destruction caused by bufh fires. It should be a criminal offence for busb fires to bo lighted without fh-cfc obtaining the necesearv permission. , Tho abolition of the import duty, or even the lowering as in the case of' Australia, to 6d per hundred, would also materially help to conseno our timbers. The outcome would be that the cities which p»y cxtensi.-e freights, etc., would be able to buy and tell in reasonable- competition with our own timbers, and they in return would be kept in tho interior for the necessary development of the country. The removal of the duty and the competition which follows will naturally stop sawmillcrs' invasion, of 'inacees.sabre places, one great cause of- the 75 per cent, rise in prices since 1900. Tho Forestry Department's work, however, would mainly lie in tho direction of re-afforestation. Besides carrying on extensive planting of varieties which aro millablo in from twenty to forty years, the Mnvmillors aleo thould be compelled to plant and &ec t-.vo trees thrjvo for every one felled. This plan has been followed in the Baltic for many years, with the Bucceßs which is at once apparent : and is now being pursuod by Americans Only by the foregoing methods can wr> hope to hays an inexhaustible supply of timbers. — I am, etc , tfOEESTRY. Vtelhngtoiij 31st Ja,uu*ry.