At the beginning of the 20th century, Taiwan boasted a luxuriant "Great Wall" of 2000-3000-year-old cypress trees stretching from north to south spanning mountain ranges at an altitude of 2000 meters. However, after the Japanese discovered Mt. Ali's cypress forests, this situation began to change.
二十世紀初，台灣從北到南，在二千公尺山脈上，原有由二、三千年檜木原始林組成的一道蓊鬱長城，但是從日本人發現阿里山的檜木黑森林後，這幕景象開始改寫。