EXOTIC FOREST

Otago Daily Times, Issue 27391, 17 May 1950, Page 6

EXOTIC FOREST

Otago Coastal Area DEPARTMENT’S PLANS Use Of Waste Lands A start has been made on a very extensive exotic national forest on land unsuitable for general farming along the coastal strip south from Dunedin. “Planting of various species . of pine has begun on about 7000 acres at Allanton, Akatore and Berwick,” Mr A. R. Entrican, Director of Forestry, told the Daily Times in an interview last night. It was intended to expand this area into a permanent exotic forest which would not only serve local and Dominion needs but possibly provide timber for export markets. Mr Entrican said that at present Otago and Southland were ' two districts which were fortunate in having a wider variety of exotic stands of timber than any other parts of the Dominion. More intensive 4 work had been carried out on these stands, especially in the Dusky forest. These had been designed however, to provide timber for local needs —the new forest was planned for a larger purpose. . Mr Entrican arrived in Dunedin yesterday in the course of a tour of the Dominion’s forests. He has been observing the Southland stands, and those at Naseby and in West Otago. The Forest Service was planning to embark on its first large-scale efforts to manage the beech forests, Mr Entrican said. The principal enemy to the Southland stands of silver beech had been found by the National Forest Survey, which had recently completed a study of the area, to be deer. He had seen in an old clearing evidence of the havoc they created. Small sixinch high bushes had thick roots which proved them to be 30 years old, but instead of being tall, they wer6 stunted through the constant feeding of the deer. , . „ It was hoped to carry out fencing of an area of about 2000 ’acres in order to ensure the success of natural regeneration. First the forest floor would be cleared of fern; then the stand would be logged and cleared to about 20 trees to the acre. If deer were kept out, the seeds from these trees, and later progeny would ensure the perpetuation of the stand. ■ Mr Entrican will go to Christchurch today.