CHAPTER XIX 

 TIMBERS AND WOODS 



FOR the most part the general character of tropical forests 

 is very different from that of forests in cold climates. One 

 becomes accustomed to forests made up of one or two pre- 

 dominating species of trees with only an occasional bush or 

 tree of another species scattered here and there through the 

 otherwise almost pure stand. Some of the familiar combina- 

 tions of trees are oak and chestnut, beech and maple, pine and 

 hemlock, etc. Besides these mixed stands of only two pre- 

 dominant species we have the immense areas of white pine, fir, 

 spruce, and other soft woods in which almost no other species 

 of tree occurs. Tropical forests present a very different ap- 

 pearance. Most of these forests consist of a mixture of many 

 species of trees. In some cases the forest is composed of 

 several hundred species of trees, with no one species covering 

 any part of the forest exclusively. The mixed nature of 

 tropical forests has offered a considerable economic disadvan- 

 tage to lumbermen in that they can not harvest areas con- 

 tinuously but must seek here and there for specimens of the 

 particular kind of tree which they desire. Not all tropical 

 forests, however, are of such a mixed nature. There are quite 

 pure stands in large areas of teak, eucalyptus, Albizzia, wattle, 

 candlenut, algaroba, oil palm, quebracho, ohia, etc. 



So much has been written of the extremely hard and heavy 

 woods which occur in tropical countries that a misconception 

 as to the relative importance of heavy woods in the Tropics 

 has taken root. It is quite absurd to suppose that all of the 

 important tropical timbers are heavier than water, although 



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