THE FORESTS. 39 



or animals may convey it dusted on some part of their bodies. In 

 accomplishing this work, insects play a very important role. Birds 

 also fertilise a few New Zealand plants, amongst others the puriri 

 (Vitex luccns) and the waiuatua (Mkabdothamnus Solandri). 



This action of insects in fertilising plants has led to a widely 

 spread error in New Zealand, and one is frequently gravely informed 

 that bees change the colours of flowers- ' inoculating ' is the term 

 used. That is to say, the opinion is held that a bee sucking honey 

 from, say, a white flower can turn it red, or blue, or yellow, as the case 

 may be. Of comse, neither a. bee nor any other insect can do any- 

 thing of the kind. If, however, the pollen of one flower is transferred 

 by means of an insect, the wind, or any other agency, to the stigma of 

 a closely related individual of a different colour, the seed which is 

 eventually produced may give rise to a plant bearing a flower coloured 

 differently to that of the parent plant ; or, in other words, a hybrid 

 has been produced. Here, then, is the source of the error in an im- 

 perfectly understood truth. 



NEW ZEALAND FOREST-TREES AS TIMBERS. 



The forests are of great commercial importance to the Dominion. 

 Some of the timbers are excellent for house-building, others are used 

 as piles for bridges and sleepers on railways, and some are ornamental 

 and can be used for furniture and general decorative work. The 

 wood of the kauri (Agathis australis} is celebrated the world over, but. 

 alas, it is rapidly being exhausted. There seems, however, every pro- 

 bability, according to the late Mr. H. J. Matthews, that a kaiui forest 

 from which the large trees have been cut would in time reproduce 

 itself. With this opinion the writer, from his own observations, is 

 quite in accord. It is unlikely, however, that such restoration would 

 be of commercial importance, since the kauri is a tree of extremely 

 slow growth. 



At the same time, it must not be forgotten that forests, apart 

 altogether from their timber value, are of the greatest importance 

 to all countries because they help to conserve and regulate the 

 water-supply a quite different matter, however, to influencing the 

 rainfall. Thus no forest-growth, whether primeval or secondary, 

 should be destroyed without some strong economic reason. There 

 are thousands of acres fit only for the natural growths now clothing 

 them, and the destruction of these forests would be a fatal mistake. 



4 Plants. 



