The mottling is sometimes caused by the tree throwing out an excessive number of branchlets, and at others by a sort of disease in which the too rapid development of cellular tissue prevents the proper expansion of the bark, and small portions become enclosed in the sap wood, and form the dark mottlings. Mottled Kauri trees are usually found in rocky situations.
The total area covered by forest in the North Auckland provincial district—of which the Kaipara forms a part—is estimated by the chief surveyor to be seven million two hundred thousand acres, about one million six hundred and seven thousand acres being held by the Crown. One peculiar feature in these forests is that while they possess several trees—among others the Kauri—not to be met with in any other part of New Zealand, they still contain all the trees found elsewhere in the colony.
The Puriri (Vitex littoralis), sometimes called the New Zealand oak, is perhaps next in importance to the Kauri, on account of its great durability. It is principally used for railway sleepers, house blocks, framings of carriages, and fencing posts. It makes excellent furniture, and is said to equal the English oak in strength and durability. Sometimes the tree grows to a height of twenty feet in the trunk, and Puriri logs have been cut nine feet in diameter.
The Kahikatea (Podocarpus dacrydioides), a white pine, is a magnificent-looking tree, often reaching a total height of one hundred and fifty feet, with a barrel clear of branches seventy-five feet long. Its timber is highly valued for the inside lining of houses.
The Totara (Podocarpus totara) is employed in making wharf piles, telegraph posts, sleepers, and in the construction of houses and furniture. It occasionally grows to a height of seventy feet or so, perfectly straight, without a knot or branch, and is used by the natives for making canoes, some of which, seventy feet in length, have been hollowed out of Totara logs. It is the only wood that successfully withstands the ravages of the Teredo navalis.
The Pohutukawa (Metrosideros tomentosa) is a very handsome tree, usually to be found growing near the water's edge. At Christmas time it is covered with beautiful red blossoms, and on that account is called New Zealand holly. The trunk is very hard, and is invaluable for knees and timbers of ships and boats.
The Rata (Metrosideros robusta) has until lately been considered by most people to be altogether a parasite, but it has now been proved beyond doubt that its seed is deposited by birds, or the wind, in the fork of a tree, where it germinates and sends forth two or three roots which creep down the trunk to the ground. These roots, as they grow, press on the supporting tree, until they cause its death, and the Rata then stands alone. The wood is very hard, and when not too twisted, may be split into very good fencing rails.
The Rimu (Dacrydium cupressinum) is a very stately pine, with drooping branches like the weeping willow. It grows up straight for about sixty feet, with a slightly tapering barrel some two or three feet in diameter at the ground. The grain of this wood is red, streaked with black, and it makes splendid furniture, balustrades and railings for staircases, panels for doors, &c.
There are a great many other varieties of trees in the North Kaipara forests, which, however, I will content myself with stating are most of them exceedingly beautiful in grain, and should find places of honour in cabinet and furniture makers' work. In spite, however, of the beautiful woods at command, the furniture-making trade has made but little progress in Auckland, and I presume the high price of labour and want of capital prevent it from being pushed.
The bushman who fells the timber and rolls out the logs receives an average wage of thirty shillings a week, as well as his food, or, as it is called here, his "tucker;" the towing charges are high, and the railway rates from Helensville to Auckland exorbitant; and so by the time the timber has passed through the mills and left the furniture-maker's hands, the excessive payments for labour, railway and towing charges, have made the articles into which it has been converted so expensive, that the trade is killed.