Notes for Forestry at Wau

Notes for Forestry at Wau.

Note No. 1. P.N.G. Forest Products Brochure (2004). (?)

Extracts: -

P.N.G. Forest Products evolved from Bulolo Gold Dredging Limited that commenced operations in large scale alluvial mining in 1932.

As the mining operation scaled down the plywood factory and sawmill were constructed by Commonwealth New Guinea Timbers Ltd.

This was a collaboration between Bulolo Gold Dredging and the then government of Australia (New Guinea Timber Agreement Act, No. 40 of 1952).

“In 1954 plywood production and the export of product to overseas destinations commenced and for the past 50 years the company has been involved in the conversion of both hardwood and plantation (conifer)resources to high value end products.

The pine plantations were also established as part of a large-scale post-mining reforestation program by the Department of Forests.

Note No. 2. Lane-Poole had determined through his systematic classification of floral zones that the coniferous forests occurred in what he called the Mid- Mountain belt, between one and two thousand metres in altitude.

Note No. 3. The location of these mills (sic) in Wau is not known, but one may have been on the site subsequently used for a sawmill by New Guinea Goldfields Pty. Ltd. Machinery would have been flown in as were components of the No. 6 Gold dredge at this time. A suitable rafting site would have been at the site of the subsequent road crossing of the Bulolo River to Crawford’s farm on the northern side of the river. This was adjacent to the eastern extremity of the No. 6 dredging site.

Note No. 4. The location of the first forestry operations in Wau at a distance of five miles, may have related to a clause in The Timber Ordinance (Consolidated) 1909, an adaptation of the old Queensland Act. This Ordinance, among other things, provided: - For the declaration of timber reserves on any Crown land, except within 5 miles of a mine shaft.

The above Ordinance was replaced (possibly following the recommendation of Lane-Poole) with The Forestry (New Guinea) Ordinance 1936.

It is not known, however, if the 5-mile clause was still invoked in 1938 when it was known that McAdam commenced forestry operations at Wau.

Note No. 5. During April and May 1960, the risk of fire damage in the plantations adjacent to Anderson’s Plot became severe, with clearing and burning being conducted on the forestry side of Magnetic Creek near Kaisenik Village. This was in the vegetation left as a firebreak. The perpetrators here and in other locations at around this time were generally native miners.

It required considerable cooperation and assistance from officers of the Mining Wardens Office and the police to redress this risk to government forestry plantations. Native miners did not require an official license to operate but were granted leases and were assisted by an officer assigned to this task, in this case Mr. Ray Frazer. A similar fire risk also resulted from employees of leaseholders with forestry boundaries in the Kauli Creek area extending their gardening into forestry land left as “green breaks.” Fire lookouts equipped with knapsack sprays were maintained in the Kauli Creek area at this time.

Note No. 6. The first buildings constructed at the Cedar Creek Forest Station were of native materials. These included a compound building, a store, and a shade house structure. The shade house was intended to hold orchids salvaged from the crowns of trees during the plantation site clearing. This was an arrangement with the Division of Botany in Lae. However, the shock of removal to ground level appeared too great and this project failed.