38 



Hardwood Record — Veneer & Panel Section 



April 25. 1922 



By T. B. Percival 



The great i-haracteristics of the mora forests of Lurinam ur Dutch 

 Gtiiana are altitude and size. The trees are tali, the leaves broad and 

 the flowers immense. Almost eyerr tree is a giant, and seems aiming 

 to grow bigger and bigger and outstrip its neighbor. The mora trees 

 are all straining to get above each other to obtain a greater share 

 of the sunlight, which is so plentiful and yet so little for each tree. 

 Tall and straight, but not so large in circumference as the great pines 

 of Australia, the mora is a 

 grand representative of hun- 

 dreds of species that inhabit 

 the forest. 



Unlike the woods of temper- 

 ate cUmates, the mora forests 

 are made up of a variety of 

 different kinds of trees, hardly 

 two of the same species com- 

 ing together, while their 

 branches interlace so far 

 above the ground that it is 

 hard to tell those belonging 

 to one trunk from those of its 

 neighbors. In every instance 

 the mora is predominant but 

 is found in commercial quan- 

 tities only on the lower reaches 

 of the Saramacca river, and 

 hardly anjTvhere else in the 

 colony. 



A peculiar habit of the 

 mora is that it flourishes best 

 on the banks of the river am! 

 never extends inland further 

 than half a mile: the greater 

 the depth from the river thv 

 less number of mora trees arc 

 met with. 



Crowded together as close 

 as their neighbors will allow, 

 each tree takes advantage of 

 the others and elbows its way 

 up a little higher. Then conic 

 the bush-ropes which hang in 

 festoons from the topmost 

 branches, some in a confused 

 assemblage of great caVdes, 

 others like miniature stair 

 cases for the convenience of 

 the monkeys, and a third class 

 like giant pythons. Below 

 there is notliing but bare 

 stems, but far above the leaves 

 and flowers of the bush-ropes 

 open to the sunlight and help 



to smother the tree which has enabled it to reach this altitude. From 

 the ground nothing but a confused mass of foliage is seen, from whence 

 drop withered flowers and fruits, the latter scattering their seeds in 

 every direction as they fall. 



The continuity of the forest is not broken by the narrow rivulets 

 or creeks, but these flow through arcades or tunnels of vegetation. 

 their dark waters looking quite black in the half light. Here and 

 there, however, where a tree has fallen, the light is enabed to pene- 

 trate, and a few smaller plants grow on the banks, or perhaps a bed 



SQUARE MOnx LOr.S ON TIIK r..\XK OF THE S.\R.\M.\CC.\ RIVER 



of cabomba or water-lilies covers the surface. 



To the botanist the mora forests are a paradise. He finds here 

 myriads of interesting and beautiful plants including various species 

 of utricularia, ground orchids, droseras, and those curious plants, 

 the burniannias. Here among foaming rivulets, running through 

 banks of ferns and mosses, grow some of the most beautiful plants 

 in the world. 



The mora trees are the homes 

 of those curious, singular and 

 beautiful productions of na- 

 ture, the orchids; they are 

 found in profusion everjTvhere 

 on the branches of these forest 

 giants. Most of the species 

 are epiphvtal. They range in 

 size from an inch high to 

 enormous masses several feet 

 through, with flower-stems 

 twelve feet high. About two 

 hundred species have been 

 euumerated as having been 

 found growing on the branches 

 of the mora. 



Ferns and selaginellas are 

 also very plentiful everywhere 

 in these forests on The banks 

 of the creeks, the prickly tree- 

 ferns with their immense 

 fronds standing in clumps and 

 illustrating beauty and deli- 

 cacy of form as compared with 

 their large-leaved neighbors. 

 The trunks of the mi.ras are 

 often decorated with a num- 

 ber of species, conimencing 

 with delicate filmy ferns near 

 the base, followed up the trunk 

 by a great niunber of creep- 

 ing polypodiums and tufts o? 

 stiff or pendulous acrostich- 

 ous, while the upper parts are 

 decorated with the beautif il 

 chrysodium. Selaginellas some- 

 times carpet the ground nith 

 their delicate, moss-like foli- 

 age, while their neighbors, the 

 lycopodiums, grow on the 

 edges of the river banks and 

 form almost impenetrable 

 thickets like miniature larch 

 forests; about four to six feet 

 high. Mosses are also plenti- 

 ful, beds of polytrichum cov- 

 ering the ground in many places, while white lichens alternate with 

 these and, with a number of small flowering plants, prevent these 

 places from becoming uninteresting. Fungi grow everywhere on the 

 fallen trees and in the debris varying in texture from the hard woody 

 families to those pretty, jelly-like, frondose kinds which are often 

 so beautifully colored. 



To come to the more important part of this article will, perhaps, be 

 more interesting. 



iCftntitiltrtI on patic 43) 



