BALSA WOOD

Waipa Post, Volume 43, Issue 3391, 22 December 1931, Page 2

BALSA WOOD

Balsa is about the lightest wood known. It weighs little more than / lbs per cubic foot, or approximately half the weight of cork. Ecuador and other countries of the American tropics possess unlimited quantities of balsa trees, and the wood has been adapted to many uses. In recent years it has been found of exceptional value in aeroplane construction, and Ecuador is now exporting increased quantities to meet the demand of aeroplane manufacturers. School authorities in various lands also find balso valuable because its softness commends it for use in manual training classes. As insulation in the construction'of houses this wood is meet-ing-a growing demand. For life-pre-servers and floats of all kinds it is unequalled. The balsa tree is found wild in forests. It matures rapidly* and at the age of five or six years the trunk may be 12 to 14 inches in diameter. The logs that form the balsa of commerce are cut in the forest, dragged to the banks, of the rivers, and then formed into rafts that are floated down the various streams converging in Guayaquil. At times such rafts are loaded with* ton’s of tagua nuts (vegetable ivory) or other commodities destined for. that port. Here the raft and contents, find a market, while the native sails homeward in his dugout canoe, which was lashed to the raft on the down-stream trip. From Gyayaquil the balsa wood is shipped in log form.and also as sawn timber. Several hundred tons of the wood are exported each year from Ecuador.