Forests.

The Wellington District is essentially a forest country, for out of the 6,000,000 acres contained within its borders 3,400,000 are still under bush. By far the largest forest is the Waimarino, having an area of at least three-quarter million acres, a large portion of it being nearly level land, containing magnificent timber, principally totara, maire, matai, rimu, and other pines. This forest is as yet hardly touched, though one sawmill has lately been started at Raetihi to cut timber for the settlers now making their homes in the neighbourhood. The distance from the settled districts or any port will render the timber in this part useless as a marketable commodity until the country is opened up by the proposed Auckland Main Truuk Railway.

The next in size is the Rangitikei-Hautapu Forest, containing an area of about 400,000 acres, a considerable portion in the Awarua Block being first-class milling timber, which will be available as soon as the extension of the Hunterville Railway-line taps it. Between this and the Waimarino Forest there is a large extent of bush land, drained by the Turakina, Mangamahu, and Wangaehu Rivers, extending up to the Wanganui River, and containing about 350,000 acres. Very little of this, from its inaccessibility, will be utilised for saw-milling purposes, but a great deal of it, together with a further block of 230,000 acres on the west side of the Wanganui River, will be cleared by the settlers and sown down with grass. A further page 41 block of about 100,000 acres of forest-land lies in the Pohangina Valley and on the slopes of the Ruahine Range. A large portion of this has been taken up and is now being settled.

The forest-land on the West Coast extends from Pukerua to the Manawatu Gorge, on the west side of the Tararua Range, and contains an area of about 380,000 acres, the bulk of it being fit only for turning into pasture. The most available part of it, alongside the Wellington-Manawatu Railway, is being extensively cut into by sawmillers at Levin and other places on the line.

After this in size is the forest commonly known as the Forty-mile Bush, containing 260,000 acres. It lies immediately north of Masterton, and is tapped by the Wairarapa Railway and the extension to Woodville, now nearly completed. It is at present being quickly denuded of timber by the sawmills established at Eketahuna and Pahiatua, and by the increasing number of settlers. A tract of fully 100,000 acres lying to the east of the Puketoi Range cannot be utilised for milling purposes, as it is not tapped by any branch railway-line, and its distance from the main line would render the business unprofitable. Nor are there any suitable ports along the coast where timber could be shipped.

The other forests are, one near Lake Taupo, the Wairarapa-Tararua Forest on the east, side of the Tararua Range, and its continuation on both sides of the Rimutaka Range, and the Haurangi Forest on the east side of the Wairarapa Lake. These consist for the most part of birch-covered hills, and cannot be considered as valuable for milling purposes.