The Memory Of An Ancient Forest

My eighty-year-old father was remembering the demise of the timber mills in his hometown of Maryborough in Queensland. He recalled barges hauling giant logs of the satinay or Fraser Island Turpentine (Syncarpia hillii) up the Mary River to the Hyne timber mill. He said that there was much excitement at the sight of these ancient giants in the river because they were destined to be shipped to the opposite side of the world after they were milled into pylons for the construction for the Suez Canal and to repair the London Docks after WWII. The one thousand year old logs were 3 metres in diameter and 35 metres in length and as straight as cylinders. He recollected that there were public protests when stories of loggers felling and discarding trees that were too large to transport and mill. He went on to say that the protests led to Fraser Island being declared a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1992. It is fortunate that the ancient forests on Fraser Island have regenerated due to the optimum growing climate and there is little evidence of the commercial logging of the area.