BIG TREES

Hokitika Guardian, 14 June 1929, Page 7

BIG TREES

Tlie dimensions of huge kauri trees in the remote recesses of the northern forests have a way of dwindling considerably when the stories about them are examined and put to tne protlf. A little while ago a newspaper correspondent quoted a report about a tree which was supposed to be “one of the largest trees in the world, if not the largest,” standing in the Wailiou Valley, Hokianga. The dimensions mentioned werefDiameter of Trunk, 22ft.; girth, 66ft. It was estimated to contain over 195,000 superficial ifeet of timber.

That correspondent wished to know more about the big chieftain of the kauri tribe, and 1 was sufficiently interested in the story to make inquiries from those in a position to know tin facts. This, summarised, is the reply I have received: The size of the kauri has lieen exaggerated greatly. A iforest ranger who inspected the tree, reported that it was dry, with the exception of a little green bark on one side—a mere shell, in fact, with walls that vary from a foot to only six inches in thickness. A hole was chopped in the side olf the hollow tree, and this was used as an entrance by climbers for kauri gum. The dimensions are: Length of barrel to first branch, 32ft; girth at saw-cut height, 44ft 9in; girth at breast height, 43f't sin; girth at centre (estimated), 42ft 4in; length to spread of branches, 49ft. The ancient tree of the Wailiou lias, therefore, shrunk to two-thirds of its original size as originally reported. It is often the way. Moreover, being hollow, there is not much hope of getting sufficient material out of it to build “three double-storeyed houses of twenty rooms each,” to quote the first enthusiastic estimate of a sawmiiler. Nevertheless, the wonderful Old Man off the Bush is worthy of respect for its antiquity. 'There was once a kauri at Tutamoe, on the northern headwaters of, the Kaipara whose circumference measured just a chain—the usual width of a road. The first man who saw it thought at first that it was a grey cliff confronting him in the bush: A surveyor measured it, so that chain girth was aumentic. But it perished by fire long ago. The same fate, I believe, has befallen a big squat old kauri-of 48ft girth, probably hollow, which I once measured near the present Trounson Park, at the head of the Kaihu Valley. Recent reports in the “Auckland Star ” mentioned two trees, one of 48ft and the other of 4.9 ft, in the Waipoua State Forest; these dimensions no doubt are authentic, forestry officers’ measurements. It is to he presumed, tlierelore, that Waipoua contains the largest known trees in New Zealand—unless someone now comes 'forward with a bigger one hitherto unknown to forestry fame. —J.C.