A NEW TIMBER ENTERPRISE.

Marlborough Express, Volume LIV, Issue 167, 17 July 1920, Page 5

A NEW TIMBER ENTERPRISE.

The question of timber supplies i* ! one 'of;-'-pressing public importance, and therefore, considerable interest/ will be awakened by the Abridged Prospectus of The Great Western Timber Company. Ltd., which haa- / recently been published. The new company is being formed with a capital df '£125,000, divided into 125,000 shares of £1 each, to> . open up and work a large area of forest in the vicinity of the Port of Okarito, South Westland. The . prospectus states .that ,shere are 10)000 acres over which the Vendors1 have ' the milling rights; 4000 acres on the shores of the Okarit» Lagoon; 2000 acres just on the south side of the little township, while 4000 acres are further noi'th near the Wanganui River (south of Hbkifcika). With regard to the 6000 acres adjacent to Okarito, Mr Gideon Anderson, Grown Lands Ranger, now Forestry Inspector, estimates that there is 80 per cent, rimu, 17 pea* cent, white pine, the balance being silver pine, totara, and matai. He further estimates that this area wilt average 30,000 feet to the acre. TheRanger has jsiven permission to statethat- he considers there is no bush in Westland that will compare with this, both as to'the length of tho boh? and'the number of trees to the acre. Tho average length of the bole of the trees in the forest inspected wasestimated to be not less than 80 feet, while some of them were 120 feet.

Mr J. Blair Mason, M. Inst. C.E., M. Inst. Mech. E., M.N.Z., Soc. C.E., the well-known Marine Engineer, visited Okarito, and his reports thereon, are an interesting account of the possibilities of working the> I»ort, His conclusion is that with toa,t« to suit the port in its present state getting the timber out is certain.

' The timber content of the forssfc areas over which the Vendors hold milling rights is estimated at tliree hundred million feet. Computed at £1 per hundred this means that the Company will'start out with an asset that should be worth £3,000,000. Full particulars of the new enterprise are given in an illustrated booklet entitled "New Zealand. Monarchs of the Forest/ which can he" obtained from any branch of the Bank of Now .Zealand.—Advt. ,