AGRICULTURAL BULLETIN 



OF THE 



STRAITS 



AND 



FEDERATED MALAY STATES. 



No. i.] OCTOBER, 1901. [Vol. I. 



THE TIMBERS OF THE MALAY PENINSULA, 



Introduction. 



When one looks over any large tract of country in the Malay 

 Peninsula, especially from a height, and sees an apparently endless 

 vista of forest, it is natural to suppose that the supply of wood 

 suitable for all purposes is quite inexhaustible, but a more careful 

 investigation into the contents of the forests themselves and an 

 inspection of the timber in the yards of the sawmills, shows very 

 clearly that the supply of first class timber for house and boat 

 building, bridges and such purposes is not only not inexhaustible 

 but is rapidly diminishing. 



It is true that a large area of the interior of the Peninsula is 

 not as yet accessible, the rivers being, as a rule, in forest regions, 

 too small for floating timber down. While there is as yet but 

 little of the country opened up by rail and the transport by such 

 roads, as there are, is too expensive for full use to be made of the 

 timber. I he configuration of the country where so much of the 

 land consists of a succession of hills with deep valleys between, 

 makes it more difficult to get the timber out of the forest. This, 

 however, is not usually insuperable, and probably in time most of 

 the timber will be made accessible by slides, buffalo tracks, &c. 

 In many forests, however, where there has been a certain amount 

 of timber-cutting, one often finds that to see what big trees are in 

 the jungle one has to go for some distance from the paths, as all 

 good timbers that were accessible are naturally removed first, 

 while even exceptionally good timber tree on slopes facing away 

 from the track, even though but a short distance away, are un- 

 touched on account of the difficultv of extraction Malay forests 

 are almost invariably mixed forests. The most valuable timbers 

 are scattered here and there among a vast quantity of inferior 

 and mostly valueless woods. It is common to find forests consist- 

 ing almost entirely of large trees of little value with only young 



