C.—3.

20

7. Current Studies. Altogether over thirty major investigations are in progress. These include a sawmill and wood survey in Mamaku region ; the introduction of shop grades into hardwood-grading rules ; the wood requirements of the cooperage and motor - body - building industries ; the collection of sawmilling statistics ; the suitability of woods for butter-boxes, and of coatings to eliminate tainting therein ; the utilization of short lengths of timber in motor-body, agricultural-implement, and brush-back manufacture ; the grading of building-timbers ; the utilization of little-used and minor species ; the operation of locally installed dry kilns ; the physical properties of plantation timbers ; the air seasoning of timber and erection of model piles throughout the country ; the strength-testing of local and exotic timbers ; the grading rules and working-stresses to be used for structural timbers ; the testing of cross-arms ; the testing of mine-props ; the testing of telegraph-poles ; the bulking of butter ; the design and strength of dairy-produce containers ; the testing of box-bindings ; the nail- and screwholding power of woods ; the preservation of telegraph-poles ; the installation and service records of treated post and pole lines ; the routine examination of wood-preservatives ; the volumetric content of cordwood ; the microscopic anatomy of the beeches ; the suitability of heartwood and sapwood of hardwoods for tight cooperage stock ; the utilization of bled kauri-gum ; the destructive distillation of spent kauri-chips ; the sap-stain and moulds developing in modern veneer plants ; and the minimizing of introduction of insects on imported forest-produce. CHAPTER IV. —THE TIMBER TRADE.I. Production. The following table showing the reported output in feet b.m. of the various species of timber from New Zealand sawmills during the years ended 31st March, 1926, 1927, and 1.928 has been compiled from figures supplied by the Government Statistician.

TABLE 11.

The sawmill production for tlie year ended 31st March, 1928, as reported to the Government Statistician was approximately 270 million feet b.m. This represents a decrease of 12 per cent, below 1927 and 24 per cent, below 1926, and constitutes the lowest cut since 1920, or the war period.

Graph 6.—Production of Rough-sawn Timber for Years ended 31st March, 1926, 1927, and 1928.

Graph 7.-Trend of Sawn-timber Production by Forest Conservation Regions for the Period 1886 to 1928.

1926. 1927. 1928. Species. 1 i Quantity. PerCent. j Quantity. j PerCent. j Quantity. | PerCent. Ft. b.m. ! Ft. tun. [ Ft. b.m. Rimii 195,452,000 554 171,489,000 56-0 156,314,000 58-0 White-pine .. 75,635,000 21-4 65,328,000 21-3 53,736,000 19-9 Matai .. .. 26,141,000 7-4 19,380,000 6-3 15,207,000 5-6 Kauri .. .. 22,766,000 6-4 18,475,000 6-0 15,874,000 5-9 Totara .. .. 14,110,000 4-0 14,179,000 4-6 10,728,000 4-0 Beech .. .. 8,701,000 2-5 8,596,000 2-8 7,923,000 2-9 Insignis pine 7,072,000 2-0 6,668,000 2-2 7,695,000 2-9 Other .. .. 3,348,000 0-9 2,389,000 0-8 2,306,000 0-8 Totals .. 353,225,000 100-0 306,504,000 100-00 269,783,000 1 100-00