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Navarro de Andrade, the man who planted 24 million Eucalyptus trees... or more.

Gustavo Iglesias Trabado

GIT Forestry Consulting - Consultoría y Servicios de Ingeniería Agroforestal - www.git-forestry.com - EUCALYPTOLOGICS

Horto Florestal de Rio Claro / Floresta Estadual Navarro de Andrade / Forestry Station at Rio Claro / Navarro de Andrade State Forest / Rio Claro, Sao Paulo, Brazil

"Go, without delay. Leave anything else you have to do. Nothing is more pressing because nothing is more precious for you to do during your trip to São Paulo but visiting the Forestry Station at Rio Claro. Anything else matters little. Here you will find what you cannot see anywhere else. Everything is unheard of, gigantic, majestic... If you want a boost to your pride of being Brazilian, but with a well deserved and fair pride, then go to Rio Claro. And when leaving the place, travel straight to Rio de Janeiro... There is nothing else of interest to see afterwards for whom got to know the wonderful work of a Brazilian whose name so few remember: Navarro de Andrade"

Excerpts of correspondence between writers Monteiro Lobato & Celestino Silveira (1945)

We have seen previously here in EUCALYPTOLOGICS examples of Eucalyptus Giants both in Europe and in Australia surviving as heritage trees, and followed the development of the Eucalyptus Atlantic rainforest in Europe from a botanical rarity to a major timber resource. But meanwhile all this was slowly happening, a major figure was to emerge from the rich soils of Brazil. Before him the industrial uses of the ubiquitous Australian trees overseas had known of the failure of Californian expectations. After him Eucalyptus forestry in America but also in the world would change forever. What he successfully started a hundred years ago was to be followed for decades by foresters and silviculturalists in four continents. He was o plantador de eucaliptos. The Eucalyptus planter. The man of A Paulista. Eucalyptus paulistana.

Edmundo Navarro de Andrade (1881-1941), the brief story of an Eucalyptus Giant

Armando Navarro Sampaio & Edmundo Navarro de Andrade / Eucalyptus Giants of Brazil / Brazilian Eucalypt Pioneers

1820's - First mentions on Eucalyptus being planted in Brazil as botanical rarity.

1897 - Navarro de Andrade sets foot on the School of Agronomy at Coimbra (Portugal), in the neighbourhood of the Karri Knight and the first sizeable Eucalyptus plantations in Europe.

Companhia Paulista de Estrdas de Ferro / Paulista Railways Company / Sao Paulo / Jundiai / Rio Claro / Industrial Eucalyptus Pioneers

1903 - Navarro de Andrade arrives back in Brazil. In some months he would be in charge of forestry experiments and silvicultural research for Paulista Railways at Jundiaí Forest Garden.

1906 - Navarro de Andrade completes the planting of 32000 eucalypts at Jundiaí to compare their growth and industrial potential for short cycle timber production against 8000 native Brazilian trees. Eucalyptus won.

Rio Claro Paulista Railway Station / Terminal de Rio Claro da Companhia Paulista de Estradas de Ferro / Rio Claro / Sao Paulo / Brazil

1909 - Navarro de Andrade starts mass planting of industrial Eucalyptus crops at Río Claro to provide fuelwood, sleepers and poles for Paulista Railways. The experience on the 2200 ha of Rio Claro would spread on over 20 extra massive plantings along the main lines of this railroad in order to create a local supply of firewood/charcoal for steam locomotives.

Navarro de Andrade Eucalyptus nursery at Horto Florestal de Rio Claro / Produccao de mudas de eucalipto na Paulista de Navarro de Andrade / Vivero forestal de eucalipto de Navarro de Andrade / Rio Claro / Sao Paulo / Brazil

1910 - Four Eucalyptus specimens leave the Paulista nurseries at Rio Claro and are planted among dozens of thousands more. But these have a certain significance. Fifteen years later they will travel as wood logs with Navarro de Andrade to the United States to be processed experimentally into a pulp of cellulose first and further into high quality printed paper, pioneering the birth of a short fibre Brazilian Eucalyptus based Cellulosic Pulp & Paper Industry.

Eucalyptus Botanical Plate at the Museum Navarro de Andrade / Lamina botanica de eucalipto no Museu Navarro de Andrade / Rio Claro / Sao Paulo / Brazil

1913 - Navarro de Andrade visits Joseph Henry Maiden in Sydney during a world tour. Eucalyptus planter and Eucalyptus botanist talk on their favourite trees. Edmundo is gifted by J. H. Maiden with plates from the Herbarium of New South Wales and provided with seeds of over 150 additional Eucalyptus species to the ones he had already trialled.

Museu do Eucalipto / Horto Florestal de Rio Claro / Floresta Estadual Navarro de Andrade / Eucalyptus Museum Navarro de Andrade / Rio Claro Forestry Station / Navarro de Andrade State Forest / Rio Claro / Sao Paulo / Brazil

1916 - Building of Museu do Eucalipto starts at Rio Claro to store the vast amounts of knowledge being generated by Navarro de Andrade, plus artifacts and samples of all products derived from Eucalyptus trees. Nowadays known as the Eucalyptus Museum "Navarro de Andrade", it is unique in the world.

Navarro de Andrade awarded the Grande Medaille Hors Classe on behalf of Companhia Paulista de Estradas de Ferro from the Société Nationale d'Acclimatation de France

1928 - Navarro de Andrade receives the Medaille de St. Hilaire and the Grande Medaille Hors Classe on behalf of Companhia Paulista de Estradas de Ferro from the Société Nationale d'Acclimatation de France.

Navarro de Andrade awareded with the Frank N. Meyer Medal for Plant Genetic Resources from the American Genetics Association

1941 - Navarro de Andrade receives the Frank N. Meyer Medal for Plant Genetic Resources from the American Genetics Association. He would pass away some months later leaving the impressive legacy of 24 million planted eucalypt trees. If not more.

1942 - Edmundo's nephew, Armando Navarro Sampaio, continues the work on Eucalyptus cultivation and starts genetic improvement protocols following the footprints and legacy of his uncle. Soon Brazilian railroads would stop using eucalypt charcoal for power generation and start using eucalypt poles to build the newer electrified lines, but steel factories were to continue demanding their timber for energy generation purposes until nowadays. At the same time one of the major Eucalyptus pulp and paper industries in the world started to develop.

Eucalyptus forest in Brazil, by Celso Foelkel / Bosque de eucalipto en Brasil, por Celso Foelkel

2007 - More than 4 billion Eucalyptus trees of over 150 species grow in the different climates of Brazil. Just a handful of them are prevalent but they have become a strategic timber resource of such a magnitude that whatever happens within this Eucalyptus Agricultural Superpower has a global impact.

Want to follow Andrade's footprints?

Visit Navarro de Andrade State Forest, Floresta Estadual Navarro de Andrade, Rio Claro, Sao Paulo, Brasil.
Visit the Eucalyptus Museum, Museu do Eucalipto "Navarro de Andrade", Rio Claro, Sao Paulo, Brasil.
Read on Companhia Paulista de Estradas de Ferro (Paulista Railways) in Marco Aurélio Álvares da Silva's Railway Website

Recommended reading

Navarro de Andrade, E. (1909) A cultura do Eucalyptus. Sao Paulo. Typhographia Brasil.
Navarro de Andrade, E. (1910) A cultura do Eucalyptus nos Estados Unidos. Sao Paulo. Typographia Brasil.
Navarro de Andrade, E. (1911) O manual do plantador de eucaliptos. Sao Paulo. Rothschild.
Navarro de Andrade, E. (1918) Os Eucalyptus: a sua cultura e exploraçao. Sao Paulo. Rothschild.
Navarro Sampaio, A. (1948) O eucalipto. Boletim da Secretaria de Agricultura, Indústria, Comercio e Trabalho. Nº especial. Belo Horizonte.
Martini, Augusto J. (2002). O plantador de Eucalyptus: a questao da preservacao florestal no Brasil e o resgate documental do legado de Edmundo Navarro de Andrade. Msc Thesis. University of Sao Paulo.
Foelkel, Celso (2006). The Eucalyptus in Brazil. Eucalyptus Online Book & Newsletter. Newsletter nº 5. A Grau Celsius / Celsius Degree Production.

Acknowledgements

To Ralph Mennuci Giesbrecht for his perseverance in the divulgation of history of Brazilian railroads, to Augusto Martini for his perserverance in the fight for preservation of Edmundo's legacy and to Celso Foelkel for his perserverance in the divulgation of Eucalyptus knowledge worldwide. And of course, to Edmundo, wherever he is, for daring. I heard the first thing he asked St. Peter to was "¿entao caro senhor, há algum horto ou jardim con eucaliptos no ceu?".

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Karri Knight, Grandpa & other Giant Eucalyptus in the Iberian Peninsula

Gustavo Iglesias Trabado

GIT Forestry Consulting - Consultoría y Servicios de Ingeniería Agroforestal - www.git-forestry.com - EUCALYPTOLOGICS

By 1866 in the neighbourhood of Coimbra (Portugal) the first cultivated forests of Eucalyptus in Iberia were established with the planting of thirty five thousand trees besides the Mondego river and at Mata de Choupal. It was an attempt to tame the stream and control devastating soil erosion caused by floods. Until then, the Australian trees were botanical rarities and relatively uncommon even as ornamental plants in public and private gardens. It was also a long time before they became a paramount timber crop for Northwestern Iberia, but this protective afforestation can be considered the beginning of such an era.

Giant Eucalyptus trees in Spain and Portugal: Karri Knight & Grandpa / Eucaliptos gigantes de España y Portugal: Caballero Karri & El Abuelo de Chavín / GIT Forestry Consulting, Lugo, Spain

Fig 1: The giant Grandfather of Chavín (Eucalyptus globulus, Spain) and Karri Knight of Vale de Canas (Eucalyptus diversicolor, Portugal), examples of monumental Eucalyptus trees in Europe

In the neighbourhood of Coimbra stands today an eucalypt tree that witnessed those times and that has grown straight and tall from the bottom of a foggy deep gorge in search of light to become the tallest Eucalyptus in Europe. It is the Karri Knight, an Eucalyptus diversicolor from Western Australia.

Four hundred kilometers to the North and twentyfive years later, a small valley in the Northern Coast of Galicia (NW Spain) was subject to works of hydraulic engineering. Its steep slopes and narrow bottom made it suitable for the taming of a rivulet in the Landro-Loureiro basin, which was dammed. Soon a primitive electricity generation plant ("fábrica da luz") brought light to the nights of the foggy coast. A network of channels to divert excess water flow was also built in order to avoid catastrophic floods to the rich agricultural fields down the stream. And here, by the 1890's, the first Eucalyptus were planted in order to, as also happened near Coimbra, stabilize soils.

Eucalyptus grove at Chavín, Souto da Retorta, Lugo, Galicia, Spain. Natural Monument. Tallest Eucalyptus grove in Europe. / Eucaliptal de Chavín, Lugo, España. GIT Forestry Consulting

Fig 2: Natural Monument Eucalyptus globulus grove at Souto da Retorta (Chavín, Viveiro, Lugo, Galicia, Spain)

More than a century later, the six hundred 95 to 115 years old Eucalyptus globulus of Chavín grow towering above the steep slopes, their roots drinking directly from channels and rivulet, to become the tallest Eucalyptus grove in Europe. The living Natural Monument at Souto da Retorta is one of the Cathedrals of the Cantabrian Coast, its pillars made of Tasmanian Blue Gums. Sheltered by the giants, a rich understorey of chestnuts, oaks, laurels and ferns grows happily in an unique microclimate.

Several of these trees are special. But tradition marks one of them, O Avó de Chavín (The Grandfather) as the main shrine of this magical place. Towering at 67 meters above that forest floor and with a perimeter at the base of more than 10 meters, Grandpa receives the hugs of countless visitors. In groups of seven!

Coastal Eucalyptus globulus forest in Northern Galicia, Spain / Bosque costero de eucalipto blanco en la Costa Cantábrica de Galicia, España / GIT Forestry Consulting, Lugo, Spain

Fig. 3: Coastal Eucalyptus globulus rainforest in the Northern Coast of Galicia (Spain)

More than a century later, coastal cultivated and feral forests of Tasmanian Blue Gum dominate the non agricultural landscape of the foggy and narrow "Eucalyptus timberbelt", stretching for miles of intricate ranges near the seashore. Among them, other Eucalyptus Giants. Considering several dimensions!