MAORI MEMORIES

Wairarapa Times-Age, 7 October 1938, Page 9

MAORI MEMORIES

SOME PLANTS. (Recorded by J.H.S. for “Times-Age.”) Of New Zealand’s peculiar and exclusive beauties in plant life, the Auckland, Chathams, Norfolk and Campbell Islands share their full part, an indication that all were once a part of the legendary lost continent, probably rivalling Australia in extent. The Chathams alone shared the privilege of two exclusive beauties, the Chatham Island Lily and the Giant Forget-me-not, probably because of its southern latitude. Of indigenous plants, New Zealand has numerous varieties, perhaps more evergreens than in any part of the wide world. The rimu is the most attractive and graceful of all our beauties. Its pale green drooping branchlets are in a distinct contrast to the rigid leaves of all other pines. The bright berries on the mature trees have a striking effect amid the green leaves. The timber is red or of a golden gleam, and greatly used for building. For planting in shrubberies or road sides it is ideal The matai as a building timber, when matured and hardened by age, will resist the nail and hammer. The polished surface as a reflector resembles a mirror. Up to twenty years the drooping foliage is like copper-tinted fern. The totara is so soft that the telegraph poles in the Waimati Plains, Taranaki, were worn thin at the base by the wild pigs using them as scratching posts, and had to be protected by nails. The Maoris made their canoes of totara heart up to 85 feet long. Some of these, known to be 200 years old, are perfecty soundl. The kahikatea (white pine) is another useful beauty of the forest. It is an ideal butter box, and, like the totara, is threatened with extinction. It has masses of delicate red berries, much in favour by native birds.