Herbert Forest

After I had completed my forestry training, I was posted to Naesby Forest where I was under the tutelage of Jack Rolls. Naesby Forest was a good little forest and I guess I was one of the last to work a draft horse to pull logs from the bush.

However I was called to Herbert Forest to become acting officer in charge because the OiC was sick and hospitalised with cancer. It was to be a three month assignment, but it turned out that I was to remain there for 25 years until the New Zealand government decided to privatise and later sell off national assets.

I was a young fellow and all the workers at Herbert Forest were 'older' people. I will name many because theirs was a contribution to history and to the nation, and I have nothing but respect for them all. They were local people who were prepared to invest in their community and took pride in their work and the asset they were helping to create.

Herbert Forest was then barely 1600 ha (4000 acres) and the oldest plantings just 17 years old, and there was only a limit area remaining to be planted with gorse being a main constraint.<3>

Land had been acquired piecemeal and there remained areas of unplanted ground which were to become a challenge to bring into forest production because they were pockets withing forested areas.

The main tool in those day for land clearing was fire and one of my first tasks was to prepare a 8 ha area for planting. There was an old homestead on this land. Nat Stevens'.

The story goes that Nat had sent home to England for a wife, and that brave woman travelled alone to New Zealand, and disembarked at the Otepopo Railway Station. On receiving instructions, she walked, carrying her luggage, maybe 8 km to the Wainakarua River, waded across and made the steep 5 or 6 km climb to the homestead, and knocked on the door. When the door opened, she met her husband for the first time! There is a small rock bluff the the East of the homestead, and they must have tipped their rubbish. One day while possum hunting, I came across it and found some of their bottles and one shoe - a high heeled one that buttoned up! 

The homestead was a wreck when I arrived there and the macrocarpa hedge well overgrown. These old trees would become a problem for our proposed new plantings, so it was decided they be felled and burnt. The workers had no experience with chainsaws, so I trained them and carried out the most dangerous work myself, because these large trees were difficult to fell.

The job took a little short of a week, and we had accomplished a good result; but not all were happy with us! The Moeraki fishermen had used these trees for years as markers so they could cross-reference their best spots! They were angry, but what could we do? They were down.

Our District Office was in Dunedin and the 2iC there had me draw up a fire plan. Fire plans were supposed to be in great detail (maps and all) and were submitted to Head Office for approval, that was the responsibility was the Chief Fire Officer (or whatever his title was) as long as the plan was followed accurately!

I had never been in charge of a fire before, but I had seen a few big ones and had great respect for it - we had heard plenty of stories about burnt people and of other damage. The workers though had complete faith in me and it seemed to me that they wanted to treat it as a day out!

Bernie, the District 2iC had promised he would be there to help me, because I was worried about the boundaries of the fire - forest with dry gorse sticking out the wire fence that surrounded the area!

Bernie radioed through that he was delayed and to start the fire on my own, so I did and he never did show up that day! The workers were good and carried out my instructions, burning away from the volatile vegetation we wanted to protect. Just below where the old homestead had stood, the fire raced up the gulley and I feared it would jump the road into an area of young forest on the other side! The wajax pump was right there so I made the order to crank it up! The fire was out before the pump got going! I had learned a lesson, fire slows down on ridgetops, and can not burn if there is no fuel! Further, the pump should have been ticking over, bypassing water.

Bernie arrived the next day to see that the fire had done a good job, but I had not followed the plan exactly, and he wrote up a report stating the fact - stirring me up a bit!

That was another lesson. Plans are just that and you have to be flexible and make changes when you think it appropriate. I was prepared to be criticised by my superiors and was not prepared to put my workers to unnecessarily at risk. These fires are risky things - nowadays considered too risky to attempt!

The next one was going to be Diamond Hill a 140 ha enclave within the forest, flanked by valuable remnants of Indigenous Podocarpus Forest.