Documenting Taiwan's ancient trees

The current trend toward localizing educational materials and recognizing the value of cultural and natural assets particular to Taiwan has combined with the government's promotion of domestic tourism to bring an increasing number of books on Taiwan's natural environment into bookshops.

People can carry such books with them when out in the mountains or exploring the coast. These books cover a wide range of subjects, including hiking trails, hot springs, birds, insects and flowers -- and a subject with a particularly Taiwanese flavor: old trees.

Several guide books on trees have been published over the last few years. The latest is A Map of Old Trees in Taiwan (台灣老樹地圖), which focuses on centenarian trees and provides the most comprehensive photographic record of these trees to date.

The book documents 400 trees scattered around Taiwan. In addition to a photograph of the tree, its condition and environment are also profiled. There is also detailed information about the different types of trees, which is handy for novices.

Chang Huei-feng (張蕙芬), chief editor of Big Tree Culture Enterprise wrote the text for A Map of Old Trees in Taiwan. The idea came to her more than 10 years ago when writing for a nature magazine.

"It was then that I realized there were so many old trees in Taiwan. We could write about only the most famous ones because information on old trees was virtually non-existent," Chang said.

Chang waited a decade before the first systematic record of old trees became available. This was in 1990, when the Taiwan Provincial Government's Agriculture and Forestry Bureau published a survey of 800 trees determined to be over 100 years old.

Chang's survey, which started in 2000, was based on the official record. The 400 trees in the book are the better preserved ones on which she could find background information. "Dozens of the listed trees have died in the 10 years since publication of the survey. More than a hundred are in poor condition," Chang said.

There was little or no follow-through on the Provincial Government's project, she pointed out.

After the provincial administration was abolished in 1999, the job of documenting old trees fell to local governments.

"Very few local governments did anything at all about this," Chang said.

Chang is planning to send copies of her book to all the local government heads as a message that it is time for them to do something.

"It's much more efficient for local governments to take up the task of preserving old trees. As individuals, we can contribute very little," she said.

Individual efforts may not be able to drive home to the public the importance of old trees overnight, but there are people other than Chang who are willing to try. After her project was rejected by numerous photographers, Chang found Peng Chi-min (潘智敏). With a flair for nature photography and an equal fascination with old trees, Peng did not hesitate before taking the job.

After quitting his high school teaching job, Peng spent two and a half years traveling around Taiwan photographing the trees and finding out their histories. His only guide was the outdated government survey.

"It wasn't a well-funded journey. I spent nearly all my money on gas and equipment. Most nights I slept in my car by the roadside," said Peng, who was questioned by police numerous times during his travels.