SKYLIFE

2002 / AUGUST

Forests are not just collections of trees, but complex habitats of plants, animals and microorganisms which interact in many ways with the air, water, sun and soil. Today Turkey's forests cover 20,763,247 hectares, equivalent to 26.7 percent of the coutry's total area. During Ottoman times forest management was the responsibility of the Imperial Naval Arsenal until 1839, when the forests were recognised as a national asset and the Department of Forests was established under the Ministry of Trade. Three years later, however, this department was closed down. Subsequently two forestry experts, Louis Tassy and M. Steme, were invited from France, and fresh steps were taken to introduce modern forestry management. In 1857 Louis Tassy established the first school of forestry, the Harbiye ve Hendeshane-i Berriye, and in 1869 new regulations concerning forests went into effect. The Department of Forests was re-established by M. Steme, this time under the auspices of the Ministry of Finance.

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Bursa Forestry Museum

2002 / AUGUST

From the 1920s onwards various departments responsible for forests operated under different ministries, until being gathered together under a single roof as the Ministry of Forests in 1991. Forest conservation is an issue of top priority, due to the importance of forests for the future of humankind and the world. Our forests are one of the most important legacies that we can bequeath to future generations. The Museum of Forestry was opened in 1989 by the Ministry of Forests with the object of acquainting the general public with Turkey's forests and their history. The museum is located in Saatçi Kösk on Çekirge Caddesi in the city of Bursa. This mansion is an outstanding example of 19th-century Ottoman Baroque architecture, named after former owner Saatçi (clocksmith) Ali Efendi. It remained a private home until 1936, when it became part of a forestry school which occupied several buildings in this area until 1949. After the school moved to the town of Bolu, the building was used to house the General Directorate of Forests attached to the Ministry of Agriculture.

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Bursa Forestry Museum

2002 / AUGUST

When the directorate moved into new premises in 1983 work began on transforming the building into a museum and collecting exhibits, and the museum opened on 29 March 1989. The two-storey Saatçi Kösk is timber framed with a foundation of stone and brick. With its monumental entrance portal supported by two wooden columns, decorative woodwork on the façade and painted ceiling decoration consisting of landscapes, animals and plants, the mansion is one of the loveliest in Bursa. The terraced garden shaded by trees features a quatrefoil fountain with spouts in the form of lions' heads and a gazebo, and is a delightful spot to relax for a while after visiting the museum. The museum consists of eight different sections, and also includes a gallery for special exhibitions, laboratory, office, stores and library.

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Bursa Forestry Museum

2002 / AUGUST

Upon entering the building the first section is devoted to the animals and birds which inhabit the forests, and includes a collection of insects, some of which are injurious to forests and others used in biological pest control. Exhibits include stuffed animals, animal horns and nests. The exhibition gallery, library containing a large archive of documents relating to forestry, and the section devoted to plants, where there is a fascinating cross-section of a walnut tree resembling a human silhouette are also on the ground floor. On the second floor is a cross-section of a Scots pine, and a tree whose tree rings reveal that it dates back to 1326, the year of the Turkish conquest of Bursa. Next to this tree is the fossil section, where there are Palaeozoic era carboniferous fossils dating from 250-300 million years ago, a plane leaf found on a sediment layer dating from 8-10 million years ago and macro fossils of gigantic sequoia trees, also known as mammoth trees.

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Bursa Forestry Museum

2002 / MARCH

These trees still grow in the Sierra Nevada Mountains of North America, and fossils found in Turkey show that two million years ago these trees grew in the Black Sea region. The sequoia fossil in the Forestry Museum was discovered at a depth of 40 metres in a coal mine in the village of Çiftalan northwest of Istanbul. In the section devoted to communications appliances used by foresters are field telephones, portable telephone exchanges and radios used since the beginning of the 20th century. Forestry engineering equipment occupies another section, with card punching and card control machines used for forestry production and marketing plans, compasses dating from the 1950s, old typewriters and other appliances. The next room contains historical documents and pictures, including an oil painting depicting Mustafa Kemal Atatürk in the woods around Yalova Thermal Spa. The section of albums and books contains forestry text books used over the years, diplomas and photograph albums.

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Bursa Forestry Museum

2002 / AUGUST

The oldest diploma, dated 1904, belongs to a graduate of Bursa Agricultural Technology School. Maps and aerial photographs are shown in another section, and include several rare maps dating back to 1910 and aerial photographs taken in 1970 showing the Bosphorus, the Datça Peninsula, Mount Agri (Ararat), Nemrut crater lake, and the Turkish Lakes Region.

* Nurcan Volkan is a photographer and freelance writer

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