73 



course occur but taken by and large it seems probable that only 

 a small percentage of the trees in any one stand would be at- 

 tacked. As Eucalyptus plantations need to be thinned vigorously 

 anyway and as the margin of profit in this form of investment in 

 Hawaii is considerable, there seems no good reason for discon- 

 tinuing the planting of Eucalypts for commercial returns, espe- 

 cially on waste lands adjoining sugar plantations, provided the 

 work is gone about in the right way to start with, and a rea- 

 sonable amount of subsequent care can be assured. 



PLANT INTRODUCTION WORK 



EXPERIMENTAL PLANTING. 



An important phase of forest work in Hawaii is the introduc- 

 tion into the Territory of exotic trees of economic importance. 

 This is a line of investigation that should receive much greater 

 attention than has been given it in recent years. Much of the 

 attractiveness of Honolulu and of our other towns today is due 

 to the introductions made years ago by Dr. Hillebrand and the 

 men in charge of the Government Nursery in its early days. 

 Many of the trees brought in by them were ornamentals. What 

 is needed now is to try out species primarily of economic and 

 commercial value. There is also a real need for supplementing 

 our native flora by the introduction of trees and shrubs of gener- 

 ally similar botanic character that could be used for replanting 

 areas in the water-bearing, protection forests, where for one or 

 another reason, native Hawaiian plants cannot well be used. 



Such experimental work is necessarily slow, and to be effec- 

 tive requires careful and painstaking devotion to details by well 

 trained men. It is slow also because many of the plants tried 

 will unavoidably be found to be unsuited to local conditions. But 

 those that do succeed more than offset the failures. 



With the machinery now at hand at the Makiki Experimental 

 Garden, a slight additional outlay would enable many new trees 

 to be started there for use at the lower levels. If then, provision 

 could be made for planting out and caring for these new species 

 from Makiki, and as well from other experimental nurseries 

 located at suitable places throughout the Territory, at various ele- 

 vations and under varying climatic conditions, a work of great 

 value to the people of the islands would be accomplished. Espe- 

 cially should propagating stations be established at the higher ele- 

 vations on the larger islands adjacent both to the native wet for- 

 est on the one hand and the high slopes of the great mountains 

 on the other. It is urgently recommended that provision be made 

 for such investigations. 



