SOME FACTORS IN THE REPLACEMENT OF THE 

 ANCIENT EAST AFRICAN FOREST BY WOODED 



PASTURE LAND, 



By Charles Francis Massy Swynnerton, F.L.S., F.E.S., 



F.R.H.S. 



I. Introductory. 



The observations of which this paper is an incomplete 

 resume, general at first, but more detailed since early 191 3, when 

 an investigation of Mr. A. K. Thayer's views on the all-conceal- 

 ing properties of forest led me to some close semi-ciecological 

 work and thus to an interest in recology itself, have extended in 

 all over eighteen years during which I have lived near forest 

 patches. For the last sixteen of them I have lived right on the 

 outskirts of the largest piece of high forest in Southern Rho- 

 desia — Chirinda — and I am including here a brief account of the 

 results of a private attempt of my own at forest protection that 

 has led to a reversal of the process described in the title. 



I have not seen this type of forest, as it occurs in East 

 Africa, discussed at all thoroughly — though it very likely dften 

 has been, for I have no access to libraries, and my own is very 

 limited.* It is im]x)ssible, actually, that the idea of its former 

 continuity should not have occurred to everyone in the least 

 ac(|uainted with the distribution of our forest plants and animals, 

 and it is the evidence afforded by their distribution that still gives 

 the idea its best support. It may be of interest, nevertheless, 

 if I state the evidence of other kinds, in so far as I have ob- 

 served it, that a single locality can produce, and discuss the main 

 factors that may have afifected the distribution and welfare both 

 of this type of forest and of its supplanter. 



My observations have been confined to the Melsetter district 

 of Southern Rhodesia, and to the. foot-hills and lowlands in 

 Portuguese East Africa that divide that district from the sea; 

 and it is to this small section of our East African floral area that 

 my remarks and conclusions primarily apply. I cannot help 

 ifeeling that their applicability is, actually, wider, though I do 

 not for an instant flatter mvself with the belief that my local 

 and still incomplete observations have given me all the factors 

 that will have contributed to the change referred to in the title 

 of this paper, or even, quite necessarily, the most important of 

 them ; and my object in writing is rather to provoke discussion 



* I cannot tender this excuse for having overlooked Mr. J. S. Henkel'.s 

 most interesting account of " Forest Progress in the Drakensberg " 

 until the very day before posting the present paper. It is pleasing to have 

 been able to confirm his observations from another portion of the sub- 

 region. I am sorry I have not seen Prof. Bews's paper referred to by 

 Mr. Henkel, or any other references to the subject, so far as T remember, 

 excepting those actually alluded to in this paper. I hope that this will 

 be accepted as an excuse for anj' resultant shortcomings. 



C 



