THE BEST SEASON FOR FALLING TIMBER.

Thames Advertiser, Volume VII, Issue 1885, 3 November 1874, Page 3

THE BEST SEASON FOR FALLING TIMBER.

Fbom Mr Kirk's paper on the New Zealand timbers, we report the portion in which he discusses the question of the best season for falling timber in New Zealand :—

" Considerable misapprehension on this subject Las arisen from the prevalence of the erroneous idea that trees have no period of rest in this colony—that they continue to grow alike at all periods of the year; an idea which may have been caused by certain fancied resemblances between the climate and vegetation of New Zealand and of tropical countries, but for which there is very slight foundation. It is true that on the coast north of the Auckland Isthmus, especially on the eastern side, frosts are but little known, so that vegetation does not receive the sudden check which is felt in other places on the approach of winter; but it by no means follows from this that trees arc growing as freely as during the spring and summer months. Even at the Bay of Islands deciduous trees shed their leaves. The oak, ash, elm, sycamore, &c, &c, are as bare of leaves during winter as in any part of Europe: it is, therefore, obvious that a complete cassation of growth takes place. At Mangcre, only eleven miles from Auckland, I have seen transplanted specimens of the native puriri, which chancfd to make late autumnal shoots, much injured by frost, while older trees in the immediate vicinity were untouched. At Pokeno, tlio pohutukawa, under similar circumstances, is cut back to tho old wood, while small established specimens sustain no injury; and in the adjacent forest tho kauri, the most tender of all our native trees, does not exhibit the slightest discolouration. It is, therefore, evident that at least a vast diminution in tho activity of arboreal growth must take place during the winter months, and this is demonstrated by an examination of tho terminal shoots of any forest trees, when it is found that tho soft pulpy condition characteristic of summer growth lias become hardened in a greater or lesser degree. Some portion of the herbaceous and fruticose vegetation, under tho favouring shelter of the larger forest trees, is doubtless in a more active condition; but oven hero growth is often reduced to a minimum, and many winter-flowering shrubs do not produce new leaves until the spring. The prospects exhibited by summer-felled totara, of resisting the attacks of teredines for a longer period than that felled in the winter, apprars to be dependent upon causes connected with the greater activity of tho sap at the former season as compared with its dormant coudition in tho latter. There can, therefore, bo no question, that, even ia the warmest, jartu of

the colony, the circulation of the sap in trees is iu a much le o s active condition in the winter season than in the summer, and consequently that the durability of timber felled in the winter is much less likely to suffer from the process offermentation than that felled during the spring and summer months. With regard to the southern parts of the colony, an examination of the arboreal vegetation at ]N T elson, Christchurch, Dunedin, and the Bluff, shows that the growth of trees is arrested in the months of .April, May, June, and probably July. So obvious-is this that I can only suppose observers have been so deeply impressed with the occasional flowering of certain herbs and small shrubs, during the winter months, in places near the sei, as to lead to the inference that a similar stale of activity must of necessity pervade the forest vegetation—an inference scarcely more reasonable than it would be to suppose that the winter flowering of certain plants in favourable localities in the British Islands, evidenced similar activity in the oak, ash, elm, and pine of northern countries. A partial exception to the general rule may perilaps bo found in the case of the kauri, which evinces a decided preference for growing in sheltered places, even in the warm and limited area to which it is naturally restricted. This appears, in ordinary seasons, especially when growing in rocky soils, to suffer an arrest of growth immediately after the hot weather and diminished rainfall usually expeperienced in January and February In compensation for this, it usually commences its spring growth earlier than the totara, black birch, rata, &0., &c, in its immediate vicinity. This arrest of growth in the kauri is probably facilitated by the comparatively shallow depth to which its roots penetrate, and the absence, in kauri forests, of the dense shrubby vegetation so abundant under all other northern trees. I have, therefore, no hesitation in recommending, as a general rule, that timber should not be felled before April or later than July, except in the case of the kauri, which in many situations may be felled from March to June; but much must be left to the judgment of the forester."