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Title: The School Book of Forestry
Author: Charles Lathrop Pack
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THE SCHOOL BOOK OF FORESTRY
By
CHARLES LATHROP PACK
PRESIDENT OF THE AMERICAN TREE ASSOCIATION
1922
[Illustration: FOREST FIRE GUARD STATIONED IN A TREE TOP]
THE AUTHOR GRATEFULLY ACKNOWLEDGES INFORMATION AND ASSISTANCE
FROM THE WRITINGS AND REPORTS OF COL. W.B. GREELEY, U.S.
FORESTER; COL. HENRY S. GRAVES, FORMER U.S. FORESTER; GIFFORD
PINCHOT, FORMER U.S. FORESTER; DR. B.E. FERNOW, DR. J.W. TOUMEY,
F.W. BESLEY, W.I. HUTCHINSON, R.H.D. BOERKER, PROF. NELSON C.
BROWN, PROF. R.S. HOSMER, E.A. STERLING, R.S. KELLOGG, E.T.
ALLEN, S. GORDON DORRANCE, DR. HUGH P. BAKER, ALFRED GASKILL,
J.S. ILLICK, AND MANY OTHER LEADERS IN FORESTRY.
"THE PART OF GOOD CITIZENS"
A people without children would face a hopeless future; a country
without trees is almost as helpless; forests which are so used
that they cannot renew themselves will soon vanish, and with them
all their benefits. When you help to preserve our forests or
plant new ones you are acting the part of good citizens.
--THEODORE ROOSEVELT.
INTRODUCTION
Our forests, with their billions of trees, are the backbone of
agriculture, the skeleton of lumbering, and the heart of
industry. Even now, in spite of their depletion, they are the
cream of our natural resources. They furnish wood for the nation,
pasture for thousands of cattle and sheep, and water supply for
countless cities and farms. They are the dominions of wild life.
Millions of birds, game animals, and fish live in the forests and
the forest streams. The time is coming when our forests will be
the greatest playgrounds of America. It is necessary that we
preserve, protect, and expand our timberlands. By so doing we
shall provide for the needs of future generations.
The forest is one of the most faithful friends of man. It
provides him with materials to build homes. It furnishes fuel. It
aids agriculture by preventing floods and storing the surplus
rainfall in the soil for the use of farm crops. It supplies the
foundation for all our railroads. It is the producer of fertile
soils. It gives employment to millions of workmen. It is a
resource which bountifully repays kind treatment. It is the best
organized feature of the plant world. The forest is not merely a
collection of different kinds of trees. It is a permanent asset
which will yield large returns over long periods when properly
managed.
Our forest fortune has been thoughtlessly squandered by
successive generations of spendthrifts. Fortunately, it is not
too late to rebuild it through coöperative effort.
The work has been well begun, but it is a work of years, and it
is to the youth of the country that we must look for its
continuous expansion and perpetuation. A part of our effort must
be directed toward familiarizing them with the needs and rewards
of an intelligent forestry policy.
CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION
CHAPTER
I. HOW TREES GROW AND MULTIPLY
II. THE FOREST FAMILIES
III. FORESTS AND FLOODS
IV. WILD LIFE OF THE FOREST
V. IMPORTANT FOREST TREES AND THEIR USES
VI. THE GREATEST ENEMY OF THE FOREST--FIRE
VII. INSECTS AND DISEASES THAT DESTROY FORESTS
VIII. THE GROWTH OF THE FORESTRY IDEA
IX. OUR NATIONAL FORESTS
X. THE NATIONAL FORESTS OF ALASKA
XI. PROGRESS IN STATE FORESTRY
XII. THE PLAYGROUNDS OF THE NATION
XIII. SOLVING OUR FORESTRY PROBLEMS
XIV. WHY THE UNITED STATES SHOULD PRACTICE FORESTRY
XV. WHY THE LUMBERMAN SHOULD PRACTICE FORESTRY
XVI. WHY THE FARMER SHOULD PRACTICE FORESTRY
XVII. PUTTING WOOD WASTE TO WORK
XVIII. WOOD FOR THE NATION
ILLUSTRATIONS
Forest Fire Guard Stationed in a Tree Top
Section of a Virgin Forest
The Sequoias of California
A Forest Ranger and His Forest Cabin
Pine Which Yields Turpentine and Timber
Forest Fires Destroy Millions of Dollars Worth of Timber Every Year
Blackened Ruins of a Fire Swept Forest
Forest Management Provides for Cutting Mature Trees
Seed Beds in a Forest Nursery
Sowing Forest Seed in an Effort to Grow a New Forest
A Camping Ground in a National Forest
Good Forests Mean Good Hunting and Fishing
Young White Pine Seeded from Adjoining Pine Trees
What Some Kinds of Timber Cutting Do to a Forest
On Poor Soil Trees are More Profitable Than Farm Crops
A Forest Crop on its Way to the Market
[Transcriber's note: "Section of a Virgin Forest" is the seventh
(not the second) illustration in the book.]
CHAPTER I
HOW TREES GROW AND MULTIPLY
The trees of the forest grow by forming new layers of wood
directly under the bark. Trees are held upright in the soil by
means of roots which reach to a depth of many feet where the soil
is loose and porous. These roots are the supports of the tree.
They hold it rigidly in position. They also supply the tree with
food. Through delicate hairs on the roots, they absorb soil
moisture and plant food from the earth and pass them along to the
tree. The body of the tree acts as a passage way through which
the food and drink are conveyed to the top or crown. The crown is
the place where the food is digested and the regeneration of
trees effected.
The leaves contain a material known as chlorophyll, which, in the
presence of light and heat, changes mineral substances into plant
food. Chlorophyll gives the leaves their green color. The cells
of the plant that are rich in chlorophyll have the power to
convert carbonic-acid gas into carbon and oxygen. These cells
combine the carbon and the soil water into chemical mixtures
which are partially digested when they reach the crown of the
tree. The water, containing salts, which is gathered by the
roots is brought up to the leaves. Here it combines with the
carbonic-acid gas taken from the air. Under the action of
chlorophyll and sunlight these substances are split up, the
carbon, oxygen and hydrogen being combined into plant food. It is
either used immediately or stored away for future emergency.
Trees breathe somewhat like human beings. They take in oxygen and
give off carbonic-acid gas. The air enters the tree through the
leaves and small openings in the bark, which are easily seen in
such trees as the cherry and birch. Trees breathe constantly, but
they digest and assimilate food only during the day and in the
presence of light. In the process of digestion and assimilation
they give off oxygen in abundance, but they retain most of the
carbonic acid gas, which is a plant food, and whatever part of it
is not used immediately is stored up by the tree and used for its
growth and development. Trees also give off their excess
moisture through the leaves and bark. Otherwise they would become
waterlogged during periods when the water is rising rapidly from
the roots.
After the first year, trees grow by increasing the thickness of
the older buds. Increase in height and density of crown cover is
due to the development of the younger twigs. New growth on the
tree is spread evenly between the wood and bark over the entire
body of the plant. This process of wood production resembles a
factory enterprise in which three layers of material are engaged.
In the first two of these delicate tissues the wood is actually
made. The inner side of the middle layer produces new wood while
the outer side grows bark. The third layer is responsible for the
production of the tough, outer bark. Year after year new layers
of wood are formed around the first layers. This first layer
finally develops into heartwood, which, so far as growth is
concerned, is dead material. Its cells are blocked up and prevent
the flow of sap. It aids in supporting the tree. The living
sapwood surrounds the heartwood. Each year one ring of this
sapwood develops. This process of growth may continue until the
annual layers amount to 50 or 100, or more, according to the life
of the tree.
One can tell the age of a tree by counting the number of annual
rings. Sometimes, because of the interruption of normal growth,
two false rings may be produced instead of a single true ring.
However, such blemishes are easy for the trained eye to
recognize. Heartwood does not occur in all varieties of trees. In
some cases, where both heartwood and sapwood appear, it is
difficult to distinguish between them as their colors are so
nearly alike. Because it takes up so much moisture and plant
food, sapwood rots much more quickly than heartwood. The sapwood
really acts as a pipe line to carry water from the roots to the
top of the tree. In some of our largest trees the moisture is
raised as high as 300 feet or more through the sapwood.
Strange though it may seem, trees fight with each other for a
place in the sunlight. Sprightly trees that shoot skyward at a
swift pace are the ones that develop into the monarchs of the
forest. They excel their mates in growth because at all times
they are exposed to plenty of light. The less fortunate trees,
that are more stocky and sturdy, and less speedy in their climb
toward the sky, are killed out in large numbers each year. The
weaker, spindly trees of the forest, which are slow growers,
often are smothered out by the more vigorous trees.
Some trees are able to grow in the shade. They develop near or
under the large trees of the forest. When the giants of the
woodland die, these smaller trees, which previously were shaded,
develop rapidly as a result of their freedom from suppression. In
many cases they grow almost as large and high as the huge trees
that they replace. In our eastern forests the hemlock often
follows the white pine in this way. Spruce trees may live for
many years in dense shade. Then finally, when they have access to
plenty of light they may develop into sturdy trees. A tree that
is a pigmy in one locality may rank as a giant in another region
due to different conditions of growth and climate. For example,
the canoe birch at its northern limit is a runt. It never grows
higher than a few feet above the ground. Under the most favorable
conditions in Florida, where this species thrives, such trees
often tower to a height of 125 feet.
In sheltered regions the seeds of trees may fall, sprout and take
root close to their parent trees. As a rule, the wind plays a
prominent part in distributing seed in every section of the
country. Pine and fir seeds are equipped with wings like those
of a bird or an airplane. They enable the seeds to fly long
distances on the wind before they drop to the ground and are
covered with leaves. Maple seeds fly by means of double-winged
sails which carry them far afield before they settle. Ash seeds
have peculiar appendages which act like a skate-sail in
transporting them to distant sections. Cottonwood seeds have
downy wings which aid their flight, while basswood seeds are
distributed over the country by means of parachute-like wings.
The pods of the locust tree fall on the frozen ground or snow
crust and are blown long distances from their source. On the
other hand, oak, hickory, and chestnut trees produce heavy seeds
which generally remain where they fall.
Squirrels are the most industrious foresters in the animal world.
Each year they bury great quantities of tree seeds in hoards or
caches hidden away in hollow logs or in the moss and leaves of
the forest floor. Birds also scatter tree seed here, there, and
everywhere over the forests and the surrounding country. Running
streams and rivers carry seeds uninjured for many miles and
finally deposit them in places where they sprout and grow into
trees. Many seeds are carried by the ocean currents to distant
foreign shores.
The decay of leaves and woodland vegetation forms rich and
fertile soils in the forests, in which conditions are favorable
for the development of new tree growth. When living tree seeds
are exposed to proper amounts of moisture, warmth and air in a
fertile soil, they will sprout and grow. A root develops which
pushes its way down into the soil, while the leaf-bud of the
plant, which springs from the other end of the seed, works its
way upward toward the light and air. This leafy part of the seed
finally forms the stem of the tree. But trees may produce plenty
of seed and yet fail to maintain their proper proportion in the
forest. This results because much of the seed is unsound. Even
where a satisfactory supply of sound fertile seed is produced, it
does not follow that the trees of that variety will be maintained
in the forest, as the seed supply may be scattered in unfavorable
positions for germination. Millions of little seedlings, however,
start to grow in the forest each year, but only a small number
survive and become large trees. This is because so many of the
seedlings are destroyed by forest fires, cattle and sheep
grazing, unfavorable soil and weather conditions, and many other
causes.
Beech and chestnut trees and others of the broad-leaved type
reproduce by means of sprouts as well as by seed. Generally, the
young stumps of broad-leaved trees produce more sprouts than the
stumps of older trees which have stood for some time. Among the
cone-bearing trees reproduction by sprouts is rare. The redwood
of California is one of the few exceptions. The pitch pine of the
Eastern States produces many sprouts, few of which live and
develop into marketable timber.
When trees are grown in nurseries, the practice is to sow the
seed in special beds filled with rich soil. Lath screens are used
as shade. They protect the young seedlings from the sun just as
the parent trees would do in the forest. The seedbeds are kept
well cultivated and free of weeds so that the seedlings may have
the best opportunities for rapid growth. Generally the seeds are
sown in the spring between March and May. Such seeds as the elms
and soft maples, which ripen in the early summer, are sown as
soon as possible after they are gathered. Practical tests have
shown that thick sowings of tree seeds give the best results.
There is little danger of weeds smothering out the seedlings
under such conditions. After the seed has germinated the beds may
be thinned so that the seedlings will have more room to develop.
During the fall of the same year, or in the following spring, the
seedlings should be transplanted to nursery rows. Thereafter it
is customary to transplant the young trees at least once again
during damp weather. When the trees finally are robust and
vigorous and have reached the age of two to five years, they are
dug up carefully and set out permanently. The usual practice is
to keep the seedlings one year in the seedbed and two years
in the nursery rows before they are set out. Whether the
transplanting should take place during the spring or fall depends
largely on the climate and geography of the locality. Practical
experience is the best guide in such matters.
Some farmers and land owners are now interested in setting out
hardwood forests for commercial purposes. If they do not wish to
purchase their seedlings from a reliable nursery-man, they can
grow them from carefully selected seed planted in well-prepared
seedbeds. The popular practice is to sow the seed in drills about
2 to 3 feet apart so that horses may be used for cultivation. The
seeds are sown to a depth of 2 to 3 times their thickness. They
are placed close enough in the drill so that from 12 to 15
seedlings to the linear foot result. In order to hasten the
sprouting of the seeds, some planters soak them in cold water for
several days before sowing. In the case of such hard-coated seed
as the black locust or honey locust, it is best to soak them in
hot water before planting.
CHAPTER II
THE FOREST FAMILIES
Trees are as queer in picking out places to live and in their
habits of growth as are the peoples of the various races which
inhabit the world. Some trees do best in the icy northland. They
become weak and die when brought to warm climates. Others that
are accustomed to tropical weather fail to make further growth
when exposed to extreme cold. The appearance of Jack Frost means
death to most of the trees that come from near the equator. Even
on the opposite slopes of the same mountain the types of trees
are often very different. Trees that do well on the north side
require plenty of moisture and cool weather. Those that prosper
on south exposures are equipped to resist late and early frosts
as well as very hot sunshine. The moisture needs of different
trees are as remarkable as their likes and dislikes for warmth
and cold. Some trees attain large size in a swampy country. Trees
of the same kind will become stunted in sections where dry
weather persists.
In some parts of the United States forestry experts can tell
where they are by the local tree growth. For example, in the
extreme northern districts the spruce and the balsam fir are
native. As one travels farther south these give way to little
Jack pine and aspen trees. Next come the stately forests of white
and Norway pine. Sometimes a few slow-growing hemlock trees
appear in the colder sections. If one continues his journey
toward the equator he will next pass through forests of
broad-leaved trees. They will include oak, maple, beech,
chestnut, hickory, and sycamore.
In Kentucky, which is a centre of the broad-leaved belt, there
are several hundred different varieties of trees. Farther south,
the cone-bearing species prevail. They are followed in the march
toward the Gulf of Mexico by the tropical trees of southern
Florida. If one journeys west from the Mississippi River across
the Great Plains he finally will come to the Rocky Mountains,
where evergreen trees predominate. If oak, maple, poplar, or
other broad-leaved trees grow in that region, they occur in
scattered stands. In the eastern forests the trees are close
together. They form a leafy canopy overhead. In the forests of
the Rockies the evergreens stand some distance apart so that
their tops do not touch. As a result, these Western forests do
not shade the ground as well as those in the east. This causes
the soils of these forests to be much drier, and also increases
the danger from fire.
The forests of western Washington and Oregon, unlike most
timberlands of the Rocky Mountain Region, are as dense as any
forests in the world. Even at midday it is as dark as twilight in
these forests. The trees are gigantic. They tower 150 to 300 feet
above the ground. Their trunks often are 6 feet or larger in
diameter. They make the trees of the eastern forests look
stunted. They are excelled in size only by the mammoth redwood
trees of northern California and the giant Sequoias of the
southern Sierras.
[Illustration: THE SEQUOIAS OF CALIFORNIA]
Differences of climate have largely influenced tree growth and
types in this country. The distribution of tree families is
changing all the time. It shifts just as the climate and other
conditions change. Trees constantly strive among themselves for
control of different localities. For a time one species will
predominate. Then other varieties will appear and displace the
ones already established. The distribution of trees changes very
remarkably from one century to another. For example, in some
sections, the red and black oaks are replacing the white oaks.
Some trees are light-lovers. They require much more sunlight than
others that do well under heavy shade. Oak trees require plenty
of light; maples or beeches thrive on little light.
The seed of trees requiring little light may be scattered in a
dense forest together with that of trees which need plenty of
daylight in order to make normal growth. The seedlings that like
shade will develop under such conditions while those that need
light will pine away and die. Gradually the shade-loving trees
will replace the light-loving trees in such a forest stand. Even
the different trees of the same family often strive with one
another for light and moisture. Each tree differs from every
other one in shape and size. Trees will adapt themselves to the
light and moisture conditions to which they are exposed. A tree
that has access to plenty of moisture and sunlight grows evenly
from the ground to its top with a bushy, wide-spreading crown.
The same tree, if it grows in the shade, will reach a greater
height but will have a small compact crown. Trees run a race in
their rapidity of growth. The winners get the desirable places
in the sunlight and prosper. The losers develop into stunted
trees that often die, due to lack of light exposure. A better
quality of lumber results from tall straight trees than that
produced by the symmetrical, branching trees. That is why every
forester who sets out trees tries to provide conditions which
will make them grow tall and with the smallest possible covering
of branches on the lower part of the trunks.
Where trees are exposed to strong winds, they develop deep and
strong root systems. They produce large and strong trunks that
can bend and resist violent winds which sway and twist them in
every direction. Such trees are much stronger and sturdier than
those that grow in a sheltered forest. The trees that are blown
down in the forest provide space for the introduction and growth
of new varieties. These activities are constantly changing the
type of tree growth in the forest.
Our original forests which bordered the Atlantic coast line when
America was first settled, were dense and impenetrable. The
colonists feared the forests because they sheltered the hostile
Indians who lurked near the white settlements. In time this fear
of the forest developed into hatred of the forest. As a result,
the colonists cut trees as rapidly as they could. In every way
they fought back the wilderness. They and their children's
children have worked so effectively that the original wealth of
woodlands has been depleted. At present, cleared fields and
cutover areas abound in regions that at one time were covered
with magnificent stands of timber.
In many sections of the country our forests are now so reduced
that they are of little commercial importance. However, these
areas are not yet entirely denuded. Predictions have been made
frequently that our woodlands would soon disappear. Scientific
foresters report that such statements are incorrect. There are
only a few districts in the country which probably will never
again support much tree growth. Their denuded condition is due
largely to the destruction of the neighboring mountain forests
and to the activities of erosion. Under ordinary conditions,
natural reforestation will maintain a satisfactory tree growth on
lands where a practical system of forest protection is practiced.
The complete removal of the forest is now accomplished only in
fertile farming regions, where the agricultural value of the
land is too high to permit it to remain longer in forest cover.
Even in the Mississippi Valley and the Great Lakes belts there
are still large areas of forest land. Most of the farms have
woodlots which provide fuel, fencing, and some lumber. For the
most part, these farm woodlots are abused. They have not been
managed correctly. Fortunately, a change for the better is now
evident. The farm woodlot owners are coming to appreciate the
importance of protecting the trees for future use. In some cases,
they are even replanting areas that have been cut over. There are
large tracts of sandy, rocky and swampy land in these districts
that are satisfactory for tree production. In fact, about all
these fields are good for is the growing of timber. Campaigns are
now under way to increase tree planting and develop the
production of lands adapted for forestry which previously have
been idle.
The United States of the future will not be a desert, tree-less
country. However, immediate measures to save our remaining trees
must be developed. The greater part of our virgin timber has
already been felled. The aftermath forests, which succeed the
virgin stand, generally are inferior. Our supplies of ash, black
walnut and hickory, once abundant, are now seriously limited.
Formerly, these mixed forests covered vast stretches of country
which today support only a scant crop of young trees which will
not be ready for market for many years. These second-growth
stands will never approach in value or quality the original
forests. Over large areas, poplar, white birch, and Jack pine
trees now predominate on lands which formerly bore dense stands
of white pine. In many places, scrubby underbrush and stunted
trees occupy lands which heretofore have been heavy producers of
marketable timber trees.
Generally speaking, farm lands should not be used for forestry
purposes. On the other hand, some forest lands can be profitably
cleared and used for agriculture. For example, settlers are
felling trees and fighting stumps in northern Wisconsin,
Michigan, and Minnesota. Some of these virgin lands are valuable
for farming purposes, others are not. It is preferable that they
should produce farm crops instead of tree crops if the land is
best adapted to agricultural use. It is an economic necessity
that all lands in this country best suited for farming purposes
should be tilled. Our ever-increasing population demands that
every acre of land useful for growing crops should be cleared and
devoted to farming. Under such conditions, the settlers should
reserve sufficient woodlands for their home needs, carefully
distinguishing between the land that is best for agricultural
purposes and the land that is best for forestry purposes, and
thus doubling their resources.
Thoughtless lumbermen have pillaged millions of acres of our most
productive forests. The early lumbermen wasted our woodland
resources. They made the same mistakes as everyone else in the
care and protection of our original forests. The greatest blame
for the wasting of our lumber resources rests with the State and
Federal authorities who permitted the depletion. Many of our
lumbermen now appreciate the need of preserving and protecting
our forests for future generations. Some of them have changed
their policies and are now doing all in their power to aid forest
conservation.
The ability of a properly managed forest to produce new crops of
trees year after year promises us a future supply of wood
sufficient for all our needs if only we will conserve our
timberlands as they deserve. It is our duty to handle the
forests in the same way that fertile farming fields are managed.
That is to say, they should be so treated that they will yield a
profitable money crop every year without reducing their powers of
future production. Private owners and farmers are coming slowly
to realize the grave importance of preserving and extending our
woodlands. The public, the State and the Nation are now solidly
behind the movement to improve our forestry and to safe-guard
our forests. Several of the States, including New York and
Pennsylvania, have purchased large areas of timberlands for State
forests. These will be developed as future sources of lumber
supply.
CHAPTER III
FORESTS AND FLOODS
Forests are necessary at the headwaters of streams. The trees
break the force of the rain drops, and the forest floor, acting
as a large sponge, absorbs rainfall and prevents run-off and
floods. Unless there are forests at the sources of streams and
rivers, floods occur. The spring uprisings of the Mississippi,
Ohio and Missouri Rivers are due largely to the lack of forests
at their headwaters. In the regions drained by these streams the
run-off water is not absorbed as it should be. It flows unimpeded
from the higher levels to the river valleys. It floods the river
courses with so much water that they burst their banks and pour
pell-mell over the surrounding country. Many floods which occur
in the United States occur because we have cut down large areas
of trees which formerly protected the sources of streams and
rivers.
A grave danger that threatens western farming is that some time
in the future the greater part of the vegetation and forest cover
on the watersheds of that section may entirely disappear. Such a
condition would cause floods after every heavy rain. The
available supplies of rainwater which are needed for the thirsty
crops would be wasted as flood waters. These floods would cause
great damage in the valleys through which they rushed. The
freshets would be followed by periods of water famine. The
streams would then be so low that they could not supply the
normal demands. Farmers would suffer on account of the lack of
irrigation water. Towns and cities that depended on the mountain
streams for their water supplies would be handicapped severely.
In a thousand and one ways, a deficient water supply due to
forest depletion would cause hardships and suffering in the
regions exposed to such misfortune.
The important part which forests play in the development of our
country is shown by the fact that from the streams of the
National Forests over 700 western cities and towns, with an
aggregate population of nearly 2,500,000, obtain their domestic
water supply. The forests include 1266 irrigation projects and
325 water-power plants, in addition to many other power and
irrigation companies which depend on the Government timberlands
for water conservation and the regulation of rain water run-off
and stream flow.
The National Forests aid greatly in conserving and making
available for use the precious limited rainfall of the arid
regions. That is why settlers in irrigated districts are deeply
interested in the cutting of timber in the Federal woodlands.
Destructive lumbering is never practiced in these forests. In its
place has been substituted a system of management that assures
the continued preservation of the forest-cover. Uncle Sam is
paying special attention to the western water-sheds which supply
reclamation and irrigation projects. He understands that the
ability of the forest to regulate stream flow is of great
importance. The irrigation farmers also desire a regular flow,
evenly distributed, throughout the growing season.
One of the chief reasons for the establishment of the National
Forest was to preserve the natural conditions favorable to stream
flow. In a treeless country, the rise of the streams is a very
accurate measure of the rainfall. In the region where forests are
frequent, an ordinary rain is scarcely noticed in its effect on
the stream. In a denuded district no natural obstacles impede
the raindrops as they patter to the ground. The surface of the
soil is usually hard. It is baked and dried out by the sun. It is
not in condition to absorb or retain much of the run-off water,
consequently, the rain water finds little to stop it as it swirls
down the slopes. In torrents it rushes down the stream beds, like
sheets of water flowing down the steep roof of a house.
Conditions are very different in a region where forest cover is
abundant. In the forests, the tops of the trees catch much of the
rain that falls. The leaves, twigs, branches and trunks of the
trees also soak up considerable moisture. The amount of rainfall
that directly strikes the ground is relatively small. The upper
layer of the forested ground consists of a network of shrubs, and
dead leaves, branches, and moss. This forest carpet acts like an
enormous sponge. It soaks up the moisture which drops from the
trees during a storm. It can absorb and hold for a time a
rainfall of four or five inches. The water that finally reaches
the ground sinks into the soil and is evaporated or runs off
slowly. The portion that is absorbed by the soil is taken up by
the roots of the trees and plants or goes to supply springs and
watercourses.
The power of the trees and forest soil to absorb water regulates
the rate at which the rainfall is fed to the streams and rivers.
Frequently it takes weeks and even months for all the waters of a
certain rain to reach these streams. This gradual supplying of
water to the streams regulates their flow. It prevents floods and
freshets. Careful observation and measurements have shown that
unforested regions will discharge rain water at least twice as
fast as will forested districts.
The stealing of soil by erosion occurs where run-off waters are
not obstructed by forest growth. Silt, sand, and every other kind
of soil are swept from their natural positions and spritted away
by the foaming waters as they surge down the steep slopes. The
stream or river which is flooded by these rushing waters roars
down its narrow channel, tearing loose and undermining the
jutting banks. In some cases, it will break from its ordinary
course to flood exposed fields and to carry away more soil. As
the speed of the stream increases its power to steal soil and
carry it off is increased. Engineers report that the carrying
power of a stream is increased 64 times when its rate of flow is
doubled. If the flow of a river is speeded up ten times, this
raging torrent will be able to carry one million times as much
foreign material as it did when it was flowing at a normal rate
of speed, causing inexpressible damage and destruction of life
and property.
The protection afforded by forests on the water-sheds of streams
furnishing the domestic water supply for cities and towns is
becoming more fully realized. A large number of cities and towns
have purchased and are maintaining municipal or communal forests
for this very reason.
CHAPTER IV
WILD LIFE OF THE FOREST
The forests of our country are the home and breeding grounds of
hundreds of millions of birds and game animals, which the forests
provide with food and shelter. If we had no forests, many of
these birds and animals would soon disappear. The acorns and
other nuts that the squirrels live upon are examples of the food
that the forest provides for its residents.
In the clear, cold streams of the forests there are many
different kinds of fish. If the forests were destroyed by cutting
or fire many of the brooks and rivers would either dry up or the
water would become so low that thousands of fish would die.
The most abundant game animals of forest regions are deer, elk,
antelope and moose. Partridge, grouse, quail, wild turkeys and
other game birds are plentiful in some regions. The best known
of all the inhabitants of the woods are the squirrels. The
presence of these many birds and animals adds greatly to the
attractiveness of the forest.
Predatory animals, such as wolves, bears, mountain lions,
coyotes and bobcats also live in the forest. They kill much
livestock each year in the mountain regions of the Western States
and they also prey on some species of bird life. The Federal and
some State governments now employ professional hunters to trap
and shoot these marauders. Each year the hunters kill thousands
of predatory animals, thus saving the farmers and cattle and
sheep owners many thousands of dollars.
Sportsmen are so numerous and hunting is so popular, that game
refuges have to be provided in the forests and parks. Were it not
for these havens of refuge where hunting is not permitted, some
of our best known wild game and birds would soon be extinct.
There are more than 11,640,648 acres of forest land in the
government game refuges. California has 22 game refuges in her 17
National Forests. New Mexico has 19, while Montana, Idaho,
Colorado, Washington and Oregon also have set aside areas of
government forest land for that purpose. In establishing a game
refuge, it is necessary to pick out a large area of land that
contains enough good feed for both the summer and winter use of
the animals that will inhabit it.
[Illustration: A FOREST RANGER AND HIS FOREST CABIN]
Livestock is sometimes grazed on game refuges, but only in small
numbers, so that plenty of grass will be left for the support of
the wild game. The refuges are under the direction of the Federal
and the State game departments. To perpetuate game animals and
game birds, it is not enough to pass game laws and forbid the
shooting of certain animals and birds except at special times of
the year; it is also necessary to provide good breeding grounds
for the birds and animals where they will not be molested or
killed. The game refuges provide such conditions.
The division of the range country into small farms and the
raising of all kinds of crops have, it is claimed, done more to
decrease our herds of antelope, elk, deer and other big game than
have the rifles of the hunters. The plow and harrow have driven
the wild life back into the rougher country. The snow becomes
very deep in the mountains in the winter and the wild animals
could not get food were it not for the game refuges in the low
country. In the Yellowstone National Park country great bands of
elk come down from the mountains during severe winters and have
to be fed on hay to keep them from starving, as there is not
sufficient winter range in this region to supply food for the
thousands of elk.
Where the elk are protected from hunters they increase rapidly.
This means that some of the surplus animals have to be killed,
otherwise, the elk would soon be so numerous that they would
seriously interfere with the grazing of domestic livestock. In
different sections of the elk country, a count is made every few
years on the breeding animals in each band. Whenever a surplus
accumulates, the state permits hunters to shoot some of the elk.
If the breeding herds get too small, no hunting is allowed. In
this way, a proper balance is maintained.
In many states the wild game birds and fur-bearing animals of the
forests are protected by closed seasons during which hunting is
not permitted. It is realized that birds and animals are not only
of interest to visitors to the forests, but that they, as well as
the trees, are a valuable forest product.
CHAPTER V
IMPORTANT FOREST TREES AND THEIR USES
Of our native trees, the white pine is one of the best and most
valuable. It is a tall straight tree that grows to a height of
100 to 150 feet. It produces wood that is light in weight and
easy to work because it is so soft. At one time there were
extensive pine forests in the northeastern states. Many of the
trees were very large, and occasionally one may still see pine
stumps that are 5 to 6 feet in diameter. White pine made fine
lumber for houses and other buildings and this timber was among
the first to be exhausted in the country.
Spruce trees have long furnished the bulk of the woodpulp used in
making our supplies of paper. These trees live in the colder
climates of the northern states. They like to grow in low, wet
localities close to lakes or rivers. The spruces generally do not
grow higher than 75-100 feet. The wood is soft like pine and even
whiter in color. The aboriginal Indians used the roots of the
spruce trees as thread, twine and rope.
The cedar trees, which are landmarks in many of our northern
states, yield light, soft, durable wood that is useful in making
poles, fence posts, lead pencils and cedar chests. The wood of
the red cedar gives off a peculiar odor which is said to keep
moths away from clothes stored in cedar chests, but it is the
close construction of the chest which keeps them out. These trees
are becoming scarce in all parts of the country. Cedars generally
are small trees that grow slowly and live a long time. The
outside wood is white and the heartwood is red or yellow. Cedar
posts last a long time and are excellent for use in farm fences.
Chestnut blight, which destroys entire forests of chestnut
timber, is gradually exhausting our supplies of this wood.
Chestnut timber has long been used for railroad ties, fence posts
and in the manufacture of cheap furniture. The wood is soft and
brown in color. The bark and wood are treated at special plants
in such a way that an extract which is valuable for tanning
leather is obtained. Chestnut trees are upstanding, straight
trees that tower 80 to 100 feet above the ground. The extinction
of our chestnut forests threatens as no effectual control
measures for checking the chestnut blight disease over large
areas has yet been discovered.
The yellow poplar or tulip poplar furnishes timber for the
manufacture of furniture, paper, the interior of railroad cars
and automobiles. The dugouts of the early settlers and Indians
were hewed out of poplar logs. These boats were stronger than
those made of canoe birch. Poplar wood is yellow in color and
soft in texture. The poplar is the largest broad-leaf tree in
this country and the trees are of great size and height. Some
specimens found in the mountains of the South have been over 200
feet high and 8 to 10 feet in diameter, while poplars 125 to 150
feet high are quite common.
Among our most useful and valuable trees are the white oak, and
its close kin, the red oak, which produce a brown-colored, hard
wood of remarkable durability. The white oak is the monarch of
the forest, as it lives very long and is larger and stronger than
the majority of its associates. The timber is used for railroad
ties, furniture, and in general construction work where tough,
durable lumber is needed. Many of our wooden ships have been
built of oak. The white oaks often grow as high as 100 feet and
attain massive dimensions. The seeds of the white oaks are light
brown acorns, which are highly relished by birds and animals.
Many southern farmers range their hogs in white oak forests so
that the porkers can live on the acorn crop.
Beech wood is strong and tough and is used in making boxes and
barrels and casks for the shipment of butter, sugar and other
foods. It makes axles and shafts for water-wheels that will last
for many years. The shoes worn by Dutch children are generally
made of beech. The wood is red in color. The beech tree is of
medium size growing to a height of about 75 feet above the
ground. There is only one common variety of beech tree in this
country.
Hickory trees are very popular because they produce sweet, edible
nuts. The hickory wood is exceedingly strong and tough and is
used wherever stout material is needed. For the spokes, wheels
and bodies of buggies and wagons, for agricultural implements,
for automobile wheels and for handles, hickory is unexcelled. The
shafts of golf clubs as well as some types of base-ball bats are
made of hickory. Most hickory trees are easy to identify on
account of their shaggy bark. The nuts of the hickory, which
ripen in the autumn, are sweet, delicious and much in demand.
Our native elm tree is stately, reaching a height of 100 feet and
a diameter of 5 to 6 feet or more. It is one of our best shade
trees. Elm wood is light brown in color and very heavy and
strong. It is the best available wood for making wagon wheel hubs
and is also used largely for baskets and barrels. The rims of
bicycle wheels generally are made of elm.
The canoe birch is a tree which was treasured by the early
Indians because it yielded bark for making canoes. Birch wood is
used in making shoe lasts and pegs because of its strength and
light weight, and the millions of spools on which cotton is wound
are made of birch wood. School desks and church furniture, also,
are made of birch. The orange-colored inner bark of the birch
tree is so fine and delicate that the early settlers could use it
as they would paper. No matter whether birch wood is green or
dry, it will burn readily. The birch was the most useful tree of
the forest to the Indians. Its bark was used not only for making
their canoes, but also for building their wigwams. They even
dried and ground the inner bark into a flour which they used as a
food.
The northern sugar maple is another tree which is a favorite in
all sections where it is grown. This tree yields a hard wood that
is the best and toughest timber grown in some localities. The
trees grow to heights of 75 to 100 feet and attain girths of 5 to
9 feet. Maple lumber is stout and heavy. It makes fine flooring
and is used in skating rinks and for bowling alleys. Many pianos
are made of maple. Wooden dishes and rolling pins are usually
made from maple wood. During the spring of the year when the sap
is flowing, the average mature maple tree will yield from fifteen
to twenty gallons of sap in a period of three to four weeks. This
sap is afterwards boiled down to maple syrup and sugar.
Hemlock trees, despite the fact that they rank among the most
beautiful trees of the forest, produce lumber which is suitable
only for rough building operations. The wood is brown and soft
and will not last long when exposed to the weather. It cracks and
splits easily because it is so brittle. Hemlock is now of
considerable importance as pulpwood for making paper. For many
years, a material important for tanning leather has been
extracted in large amounts from the bark of hemlock trees.
One of the most pleasing uses to which the balsam fir is put is
as Christmas trees. Sometimes it is used in making paper pulp.
The balsam fir seldom grows higher than 50 feet or thicker than
12 inches. The leaves of this tree have a very sweet odor and are
in demand at Christmas time. Foresters and woodsmen often use
balsam boughs to make their beds and pillows when camping in the
woods.
[Illustration: PINE WHICH YIELDS TURPENTINE AND TIMBER]
Our native supplies of hardwoods and softwoods are used for
general building purposes, for farm repairs, for railroad ties,
in the furniture and veneer industry, in the handle industry, and
in the vehicle and agricultural implement industries. On the
average each American farmer uses about 2,000 board feet of
lumber each year. New farm building decreased in the several
years following the World War, due to the high price of lumber
and labor. As a result of this lack of necessary building,
millions of dollars worth of farm machinery stood out in the
weather. Livestock lacked stables in some sections. Very little
building was done in that period in two hundred and fifty
prosperous agricultural counties in thirty-two different states.
The railroads consume about 15 per cent. of our total lumber cut.
They use between 100,000,000 and 125,000,000 railroad ties a
year. It used to be that most of the cross-ties were of white oak
cut close to the places where they were used. Now Douglas fir,
southern pine and other woods are being used largely throughout
the Middle Western and Eastern States. The supply of white oak
ties is small and the prices are high. Some years ago, when white
oak was abundant, the railroads that now are using other
cross-ties would not have even considered such material for use
in their roadbeds. The fact that other ties are now being used
emphasizes the fact that we are short on oak timber in the
sections where this hardwood formerly was common.
The furniture industry uses hardwoods of superior grade and
quality. The factories of this industry have moved from region to
region as the supply of hardwoods became depleted. Originally,
these factories were located in the Northeastern States. Then, as
the supplies of hardwood timber in those sections gave out, they
moved westward. They remained near the Corn Belt until the
virgin hardwood forests of the Middle West were practically
exhausted. The furniture industry is now largely dependent on
what hardwoods are left in the remote sections of the Southern
Appalachians and the lower Mississippi Valley. When these limited
supplies are used up, there will be very little more old-growth
timber in the country for them to use.
The furniture, veneer, handle, vehicle, automobile and
agricultural implement industries all are in competition for
hardwood timber. The furniture industry uses 1,250,000,000 feet
of high-grade hardwood lumber annually. Production of timber of
this type for furniture has decreased as much as 50 per cent.
during the past few years. It is now difficult for the furniture
factories and veneer plants to secure enough raw materials.
Facilities for drying the green lumber artificially are few. It
used to be that the hardwood lumber was seasoned for six to nine
months before being sold. Furniture dealers now have to buy the
material green from the sawmills. Competition has become so keen
that buyers pay high prices. They must have the material to keep
their plants running and to supply their trade.
The veneer industry provides furniture manufacturers, musical
instrument factories, box makers and the automobile industry with
high-grade material. The industry uses annually 780,000,000 board
feet of first quality hardwood cut from virgin stands of timber.
Red gum and white oak are the hardwoods most in demand. In the
Lake States, a branch of the veneer industry which uses maple,
birch and basswood is located. Oak formerly was the most
important wood used. Now red gum has replaced the oak, as the
supplies of the latter timber have dwindled. At present there is
less than one-fourth of a normal supply of veneer timber in
sight. Even the supplies in the farmers' woodlands are being
depleted. The industry is now largely dependent on the timber of
the southern Mississippi Valley. The veneer industry requires
best-grade material. Clear logs are demanded that are at least 16
inches in diameter at the small end. It is getting harder every
year to secure such logs. Like the furniture industry, the veneer
mills lack adequate supplies of good timber.
No satisfactory substitutes for the hickory and ash used in the
handle industry have yet been found. About the only stocks of
these timbers now left are in the Southern States. Even in those
parts the supplies are getting short and it is necessary to cut
timber in the more remote sections distant from the railroad. The
ash shortage is even more serious than that of hickory timber.
The supplies of ash in the Middle West States north of the Ohio
River are practically exhausted. The demand for ash and hickory
handles is larger even than before the World War. The entire
world depends on the United States for handles made from these
woods. Handle dealers are now willing to pay high prices for ash
and hickory timber. Some of them prepared for the shortage by
buying tracts of hardwood timber. When these reserves are cut
over, these dealers will be in the same position as the rest of
the trade.
Ash and hickory are in demand also by the vehicle and
agricultural implement industries. They also use considerable oak
and compete with the furniture industry to secure what they need
of this timber. Most of these plants are located in the Middle
West but they draw their timber chiefly from the South. Hickory
is a necessary wood to the vehicle industry for use in spokes and
wheels. The factories exert every effort to secure adequate
supplies of timber from the farm woodlands, sawmills and logging
camps. The automobile industry now uses considerable hickory in
the wheels and spokes of motor cars.
Most of the stock used by the vehicle industry is purchased
green. Neither the lumber nor vehicle industry is equipped with
enough kilns for curing this green material. The losses in
working and manufacturing are heavy, running as high as 40 per
cent. Many substitutes for ash, oak and hickory have been tried
but they have failed to prove satisfactory. On account of the
shortage and the high prices of hickory, vehicle factories are
using steel in place of hickory wherever possible. Steel is more
expensive but it can always be secured in quantity when needed.
Furthermore, it is durable and very strong.
Thus we see that our resources of useful soft woods and hard
woods have both been so diminished that prompt reforestation of
these species is an urgent necessity.
CHAPTER VI
THE GREATEST ENEMY OF THE FOREST--FIRE
Our forests are exposed to destruction by many enemies, the worst
of which is fire. From 8,000,000 to 12,000,000 acres of forest
lands annually are burned over by destructive fires. These fires
are started in many different ways. They may be caused by sparks
or hot ashes from a locomotive. Lightning strikes in many forests
every summer, particularly those of the Western States, and
ignites many trees. In the South people sometimes set fires in
order to improve the grazing. Settlers and farmers who are
clearing land often start big brush fires that get out of
their control. Campers, tourists, hunters, and fishermen are
responsible for many forest fires by neglecting to extinguish
their campfires. Sparks from logging engines also cause fires.
Cigar and cigarette stubs and burning matches carelessly thrown
aside start many forest fires. Occasionally fires are also
maliciously set by evil-minded people.
The officers of the National Forests in the West have become
very expert in running down the people who set incendiary fires.
They collect evidence at the scene of the fire, such as pieces of
letters and envelopes, matches, lost handkerchiefs and similar
articles. They hunt for foot tracks and hoof marks. They study
automobile tire tracks. They make plaster of Paris impressions of
these tracks. They follow the tracks--sometimes Indian fashion.
Often there are peculiarities about the tracks which lead to the
detection and punishment of the culprits. A horse may be shod in
an unusual manner; a man may have peculiar hob nails or rubber
heels on his boots or else his footprints may show some
deformity. The forest rangers play the parts of detectives very
well. This novel police work has greatly reduced the number of
incendiary fires.
[Illustration: FOREST FIRES DESTROY MILLIONS OF DOLLARS WORTH OF
TIMBER EVERY YEAR]
A forest fire may destroy in a few hours trees that required
hundreds of years to grow. A heavy stand of timber may be reduced
to a desolate waste because some one forgot to put out a
campfire. Occasionally large forest fires burn farm buildings and
homes and kill hundreds of people. During the dry summer season
when a strong wind is blowing, the fire will run for many miles.
It always leaves woe and desolation in its wake. A mammoth
forest fire in Wisconsin many years ago burned over an area of
two thousand square miles. It killed about fourteen hundred
people and destroyed many millions of dollars worth of timber and
other property. A big forest fire in Michigan laid waste a tract
forty miles wide and one hundred and eighty miles long. More than
four billion feet of lumber, worth $10,000,000, was destroyed and
several hundred people lost their lives. In recent years, a
destructive forest fire in Minnesota caused a loss of $25,000,000
worth of timber and property.
There are several different kinds of forest fires. Some burn
unseen two to four feet beneath the surface of the ground. Where
the soil contains much peat, these fires may persist for weeks or
even months. Sometimes, they do not give off any noticeable
smoke. Their fuel is the decaying wood, tree roots and similar
material in the soil. These underground fires can be stopped only
by flooding the area or by digging trenches down to the mineral
soil. The most effectual way to fight light surface fires is to
throw sand or earth on the flames. Where the fire has not made
much headway, the flames can sometimes be beaten out with green
branches, wet gunny sacks or blankets. The leaves and debris may
be raked away in a path so as to impede their advance.
Usually in the hardwood forests, there is not much cover, such as
dry leaves, on the ground. Fires in these forests destroy the
seedlings and saplings, but do not usually kill the mature trees.
However, they damage the base of the trees and make it easy for
fungi and insects to enter. They also burn the top soil and
reduce the water-absorbing powers of the forest floor. In thick,
dense evergreen forests where the carpet is heavy, fires are much
more serious. They frequently kill the standing trees, burning
trunks and branches and even following the roots deep into the
ground. Dead standing trees and logs aid fires of this kind. The
wind sweeps pieces of burning bark or rotten wood great distances
to kindle new fires. When they fall, dead trees scatter sparks
and embers over a wide belt. Fires also run along the tops of the
coniferous trees high above the ground. These are called
"crown-fires" and are very difficult to control.
The wind plays a big part in the intensity of a forest fire. If
the fire can be turned so that it will run into the wind, it can
be put out more easily. Fires that have the wind back of them and
plenty of dry fuel ahead, speed on their way of destruction at a
velocity of 5 to 10 miles an hour, or more. They usually destroy
everything in their course that will burn, and waste great
amounts of valuable timber. Wild animals, in panic, run together
before the flames. Settlers and farmers with their families flee.
Many are overtaken in the mad flight and perish. The fierce fires
of this type can be stopped only by heavy rain, a change of wind,
or by barriers which provide no fuel and thus choke out the
flames.
Large fires are sometimes controlled by back-firing. A back-fire
is a second fire built and so directed as to run against the wind
and toward the main fire. When the two fires meet, both will go
out on account of lack of fuel. When properly used by experienced
persons, back-fires are very effectual. In inexperienced hands
they are dangerous, as the wind may change suddenly or they may
be lighted too soon. In such cases they often become as great a
menace as the main fire. Another practical system of fighting
fires is to make fire lines around the burning area. These fire
lines or lanes as they are sometimes called, are stretches of
land from which all trees and shrubs have been removed. In the
centre of the lines a narrow trench is dug to mineral soil or the
lines are plowed or burned over so that they are bare of fuel.
Such lines also are of value around woods and grain fields to
keep the fire out. They are commonly used along railroad tracks
where locomotive sparks are a constant source of fire dangers.
Our forests, on account of their great size and the relatively
small man force which guards them, are more exposed to fire
dangers than any other woodlands in the world. The scant rainfall
of many of the western states where great unbroken areas of
forest are located increases the fire damages. The fact that the
western country in many sections is sparsely settled favors
destruction by forest fires. The prevalence of lightning in the
mountains during the summer adds farther to the danger. One of
the most important tasks of the rangers in the Federal forests is
to prevent forest fires.
During the fire season, extra forest guards are kept busy hunting
for signs of smoke throughout the forests. The lookouts in their
high towers, which overlook large areas of forest, watch
constantly for smoke, and as soon as they locate signs of fire
they notify the supervisor of the forest. Lookouts use special
scientific instruments which enable them to locate the position
of the fires from the smoke. At the supervisor's headquarters and
the ranger stations scattered through the forests, equipment,
horses and automobiles are kept ready for instant use when a fire
is reported. Telephone lines and radio sets are used to spread
the news about fires that have broken out.
From five thousand to six thousand forest fires occur each year
in the National Forests of our country. To show how efficient the
forest rangers are in fighting fires, it is worthy of note that
by their prompt actions, 80 per cent. of these fires are confined
to areas of less than ten acres each, while only 20 per cent.
spread over areas larger than ten acres. Lightning causes from 25
to 30 per cent. of the fires. The remaining 70 or 75 per cent.
are classed as "man-caused fires," which are set by campers,
smokers, railroads, brush burners, sawmills and incendiaries. The
total annual loss from forest fires in the Federal forests varies
from a few hundred thousands of dollars in favorable years to
several million in particularly bad fire seasons. During the last
few years, due to efficient fire-fighting methods, the annual
losses have been steadily reduced.
The best way of fighting forest fires is to prevent them. The
forest officers do their best to reduce the chances for fire
outbreak in the Government woodlands. They give away much dead
timber that either has fallen or still is standing. Lumbermen who
hold contracts to cut timber in the National Forest are required
to pile and burn all the slashings. Dry grass is a serious fire
menace. That is why grazing is encouraged in the forests. Rangers
patrol the principal automobile roads to see that careless
campers and tourists have not left burning campfires. Railroads
are required to equip their locomotives with spark-arresters.
They also are obliged to keep their rights of way free of
material which burns readily. Spark-arresters are required also
on logging engines.
The National and State Forests are posted with signs and notices
asking the campers and tourists to be careful with campfires,
tobacco and matches. Advertisements are run in newspapers,
warning people to be careful so as not to set fire to the
forests. Exhibits are made at fairs, shows, community meetings
and similar gatherings, showing the dangers from forest fires and
how these destructive conflagrations may be controlled. Every
possible means is used to teach the public to respect and protect
the forests.
[Illustration: BLACKENED RUINS OF A FIRE-SWEPT FOREST]
For many years, the United States Forest Service and State
Forestry Departments have been keeping a record of forest fires
and their causes. Studies have been made of the length and
character of each fire season. Information has been gathered
concerning the parts of the forest where lightning is most likely
to strike or where campfires are likely to be left by tourists.
The spots or zones of greatest fire danger are located in this
way and more forest guards are placed in these areas during the
dangerous fire season. Careful surveys of this kind are aiding
greatly in reducing the number of forest fires.
In trying to get all possible information about future weather
conditions, the Forestry Departments coöperate with the United
States Weather Bureau. When the experts predict that long periods
of dry weather or dangerous storms are approaching, the forest
rangers are especially watchful, as during such times, the menace
to the woods is greatest. The rangers also have big fire maps
which they hang in their cabins. These maps show the location of
dangerous fire areas, roads, trails, lookout-posts, cities, towns
and ranches, sawmills, logging camps, telephone lines, fire tool
boxes and other data of value to fire fighters. All this
information is so arranged as to be readily available in time of
need. It shows where emergency fire fighters, tools and food
supplies can be secured, and how best to attack a fire in any
certain district. A detailed plan for fighting forest fires is
also prepared and kept on file at every ranger station.
The following are six rules which, if put in practice, will help
prevent outbreaks of fires:
1. Matches.--Be sure your match is out. Break it in two before
you throw it away.
2. Tobacco.--Throw pipe ashes and cigar or cigarette stubs in the
dust of the road and stamp or pinch out the fire before leaving
them. Don't throw them into the brush, leaves or needles.
3. Making camp.--Build a small campfire. Build it in the open,
not against a tree or log, or near brush. Scrape away the trash
from all around it.
4. Leaving camp.--Never leave a campfire, even for a short time,
without quenching it with water or earth. Be sure it is OUT.
5. Bonfires.--Never build bonfires in windy weather or where
there is the slightest danger of their escaping from control.
Don't make them larger than you need.
6. Fighting fires.--If you find a fire, try to put it out. If you
can't, get word of it to the nearest United States forest ranger
or State fire warden at once.
Remember "minutes count" in reporting forest fires.
CHAPTER VII
INSECTS AND DISEASES THAT DESTROY FORESTS
Forest insects and tree diseases occasion heavy losses each year
among the standing marketable trees. Insects cause a total loss
of more than $100,000,000 annually to the forest products of the
United States. A great number of destructive insects are
constantly at work in the forests injuring or killing live trees
or else attacking dead timber. Forest weevils kill tree seeds and
destroy the young shoots on trees. Bark and timber beetles bore
into and girdle trees and destroy the wood. Many borers and
timber worms infest logs and lumber after they are cut and before
they are removed from the forest. This scattered work of the
insects here, there, and everywhere throughout the forests causes
great damage.
Different kinds of flies and moths deposit their eggs on the
leaves of the trees. After the eggs hatch, the baby caterpillars
feed on the tender, juicy leaves. Some of the bugs destroy all
the leaves and thus remove an important means which the tree has
of getting food and drink. Wire worms attack the roots of the
tree. Leaf hoppers suck on the sap supply of the leaves. Leaf
rollers cause the leaves to curl up and die. Trees injured by
fire fall easy prey before the attacks of forest insects. It
takes a healthy, sturdy tree to escape injury by these pirates of
the forests. There are more than five hundred insects that attack
oak trees and at least two hundred and fifty different species
that carry on destruction among the pines.
Insect pests have worked so actively that many forests have lost
practically all their best trees of certain species. Quantities
of the largest spruce trees in the Adirondacks have been killed
off by bark beetles. The saw-fly worm has killed off most of the
mature larches in these eastern forests. As they travel over the
National and State Forests, the rangers are always on the watch
for signs of tree infection. Whenever they notice red-brown
masses of pitch and sawdust on the bark of the trees, they know
that insects are busy there. Where the needles of a pine or
spruce turn yellow or red, the presence of bark beetles is shown.
Signs of pitch on the bark of coniferous trees are the first
symptoms of infection. These beetles bore through the bark and
into the wood. There they lay eggs. The parent beetles soon die
but their children continue the work of burrowing in the wood.
Finally, they kill the tree by making a complete cut around the
trunk through the layers of wood that act as waiters to carry the
food from the roots to the trunk, branches and leaves. The next
spring these young develop into full-grown beetles, and come out
from the diseased tree. They then attack new trees.
When the forest rangers find evidences of serious infection, they
cut down the diseased trees. They strip the bark from the trunk
and branches and burn it in the fall or winter when the beetles
are working in the bark and can be destroyed most easily. If the
infection of trees extends over a large tract, and there is a
nearby market for the lumber the timber is sold as soon as
possible. Trap trees are also used in controlling certain species
of injurious forest insects. Certain trees are girdled with an ax
so that they will become weakened or die, and thus provide easy
means of entrance for the insects. The beetles swarm to such
trees in great numbers. When the tree is full of insects, it is
cut down and burned. In this way, infections which are not too
severe can often be remedied.
The bark-boring beetles are the most destructive insects that
attack our forests. They have wasted enormous tracts of pine
timber throughout the southern states. The eastern spruce beetle
has destroyed countless feet of spruce. The Engelmann spruce
beetle has devastated many forests of the Rocky Mountains. The
Black Hills beetle has killed billions of feet of marketable
timber in the Black Hills of South Dakota. The hickory bark
beetle, the Douglas fir beetle and the larch worm have been very
destructive.
Forest fungi cause most of the forest tree diseases. A tree
disease is any condition that prevents the tree from growing and
developing in a normal, healthy manner. Acid fumes from smelters,
frost, sunscald, dry or extremely wet weather, all limit the
growth of trees. Leaf diseases lessen the food supplies of the
trees. Bark diseases prevent the movement of the food supplies.
Sapwood ailments cut off the water supply that rises from the
roots. Seed and flower diseases prevent the trees from producing
more of their kind.
Most of the tree parasites can gain entrance to the trees only
through knots and wounds. Infection usually occurs through wounds
in the tree trunk or branches caused by lightning, fire, or by
men or animals. The cone-bearing trees give off pitch to cover
such wounds. In this way they protect the injuries against
disease infection. The hardwood trees are unable to protect their
wounds as effectively as the evergreens. Where the wound is
large, the exposed sapwood dies, dries out, and cracks. The fungi
enter these cracks and work their way to the heartwood. Many of
the fungi cannot live unless they reach the heartwood of the
tree. Fires wound the base and trunks of forest trees severely so
that they are exposed to serious destruction by heartrot.
Foresters try to locate and dispose of all the diseased trees in
the State and Government forests. They strive to remove all the
sources of tree disease from the woods. They can grow healthy
trees if all disease germs are kept away from the timberlands.
Some tree diseases have become established so strongly in forest
regions that it is almost impossible to drive them out. For
example, chestnut blight is a fungous disease that is killing
many of our most valuable chestnut trees. The fungi of this
disease worm their way through the holes in the bark of the
trees, and spread around the trunk. Diseased patches or cankers
form on the limbs or trunk of the tree. After the canker forms on
the trunk, the tree soon dies. Chestnut blight has killed most of
the chestnut trees in New York and Pennsylvania. It is now active
in Virginia and West Virginia and is working its way down into
North and South Carolina.
[Illustration: SECTION OF A VIRGIN FOREST]
Diseased trees are a menace to the forest. They rob the healthy
trees of space, light and food. That is why it is necessary to
remove them as soon as they are discovered. In the smaller and
older forests of Europe, tree surgery and doctoring are practised
widely. Wounds are treated and cured and the trees are pruned and
sprayed at regular intervals. In our extensive woods such
practices are too expensive. All the foresters can do is to cut
down the sick trees in order to save the ones that are sound.
There is a big difference between tree damages caused by forest
insects and those caused by forest fungi and mistletoe. The
insects are always present in the forest. However, it is only
occasionally that they concentrate and work great injury and
damage in any one section. At rare intervals, some very
destructive insects may centre their work in one district. They
will kill a large number of trees in a short time. They continue
their destruction until some natural agency puts them to flight.
The fungi, on the other hand, develop slowly and work over long
periods. Sudden outbreaks of fungous diseases are unusual.
Heavy snows, lightning and wind storms also lay low many of
the tree giants of the forest. Heavy falls of snow may weigh
down the young, tall trees to such an extent that they break.
Lightning--it is worst in the hills and mountains of the western
states--may strike and damage a number of trees in the same
vicinity. If these trees are not killed outright, they are
usually damaged so badly that forest insects and fungi complete
their destruction.
Big trees are sometimes uprooted during forest storms so that
they fall on younger trees and cripple and deform them. Winds
benefit the forests in that they blow down old trees that are no
longer of much use and provide space for younger and healthier
trees to grow. Usually the trees that are blown down have shallow
roots or else are situated in marshy, wet spots so that their
root-hold in the soil is not secure. Trees that have been exposed
to fire are often weakened and blown down easily.
Where excessive livestock grazing is permitted in young forests
considerable damage may result. Goats, cattle and sheep injure
young seedlings by browsing. They eat the tender shoots of the
trees. The trampling of sheep, especially on steep hills, damages
the very young trees. On mountain sides the trampling of sheep
frequently breaks up the forest floor of sponge-like grass and
debris and thus aids freshets and floods. In the Alps of France
sheep grazing destroyed the mountain forests and, later on, the
grass which replaced the woods. Destructive floods resulted. It
has cost the French people many millions of dollars to repair the
damage done by the sheep.
The Federal Government does its best to keep foreign tree
diseases out of the United States. As soon as any serious disease
is discovered in foreign countries the Secretary of Agriculture
puts in force a quarantine against that country. No seed or tree
stock can be imported. Furthermore, all the new species of trees,
cuttings or plants introduced to this country are given thorough
examination and inspection by government experts at the ports
where the products are received from abroad. All diseased trees
are fumigated, or if found diseased, destroyed. In this manner
the Government protects our country against new diseases which
might come to our shores on foreign plants and tree stock.
CHAPTER VIII
THE GROWTH OF THE FORESTRY IDEA
Our forests of the New World were so abundant when the early
settlers landed on the Atlantic Coast that it was almost
impossible to find enough cleared land in one tract to make a
40-acre farm. These thick, dense timberlands extended westward to
the prairie country. It was but natural, therefore, that the
forest should be considered by these pioneers as an obstacle and
viewed as an enemy. Farms and settlements had to be hewed out of
the timberlands, and the forests seemed inexhaustible.
Experts say that the original, virgin forests of the United
States covered approximately 822,000,000 acres. They are now
shrunk to one-sixth of that area. At one time they were the
richest forests in the world. Today there are millions of acres
which contain neither timber nor young growth. Considerable can
be restored if the essential measures are started on a national
scale. Such measures would insure an adequate lumber supply for
all time to come.
Rules and regulations concerning the cutting of lumber and the
misuse of forests were suggested as early as the seventeenth
century. Plymouth Colony in 1626 passed an ordinance prohibiting
the cutting of timber from the Colony lands without official
consent. This is said to be the first conservation law passed in
America. William Penn was one of the early champions of the
"Woodman, spare that tree" slogan. He ordered his colonists to
leave one acre of forest for every five acres of land that were
cleared.
In 1799 Congress set aside $200,000 for the purchase of a small
forest reserve to be used as a supply source of ship timbers for
the Navy. About twenty-five years later, it gave the President
the power to call upon the Army and Navy whenever necessary to
protect the live oak and red cedar timber so selected in Florida.
In 1827, the Government started its first work in forestry. It
was an attempt to raise live oak in the Southern States to
provide ship timbers for the Navy. Forty years later, the
Wisconsin State Legislature began to investigate the destruction
of the forests of that state in order to protect them and prolong
their life. Michigan and Maine, in turn, followed suit. These
were some of the first steps taken to study our forests and
protect them against possible extinction.
The purpose of the Timber Culture Act passed by Congress in 1873
was to increase national interest in reforestation. It provided
that every settler who would plant and maintain 40 acres of
timber in the treeless sections should be entitled to secure
patent for 160 acres of the public domain--that vast territory
consisting of all the states and territories west of the
Mississippi, except Texas, as well as Ohio, Indiana, Illinois,
Michigan, Wisconsin, Florida, Alabama and Mississippi. This act,
as well as several State laws, failed because the settlers did
not know enough about tree planting. The laws also were not
effective because they did not prevent dishonest practices.
In 1876, the first special agent in forestry was appointed by the
Commissioner of Agriculture to study the annual consumption,
exportation and importation of timber and other forest products,
the probable supply for future wants, and the means best adapted
for forest preservation. Five years later, the Division of
Forestry was organized as a branch of the Department of
Agriculture. It was established in order to carry on
investigations about forestry and how to preserve our trees.
[Illustration: CUTTING MATURE TREES AND LEAVING SEED TREES TO
INSURE A SECOND CROP]
For some nine years the Division of Forestry was nothing more
than a department of information. It distributed technical facts
and figures about the management of private woodlands and
collected data concerning our forest resources. It did not manage
any of the Government timberlands because there were no forest
reserves at that time. It was not until 1891 that the first
forest reserve, the Yellowstone Park Timberland Reserve, was
created by special proclamation of President Harrison. Later it
became part of the National Park reserves. Although the Division
of Forestry had no special powers to oversee and direct the
management of the forest reserves, during the next six years a
total of 40,000,000 acres of valuable timberland were so
designated and set aside. At the request of the Secretary of the
Interior, the National Academy of Sciences therefore worked out a
basis for laws governing national forests. Congress enacted this
law in 1897. Thereafter the Department of the Interior had active
charge of the timberlands. At that time little was known
scientifically about the American forests. There were no
schools of forestry in this country. During the period 1898-1903,
several such schools were established.
President McKinley, during his term of office, increased the
number of forest reserves from 28 to over 40, covering a total
area of 30,000,000 acres. President Roosevelt added many millions
of acres to the forest reserves, bringing the net total to more
than 150,000,000 acres, including 159 different forests. In 1905,
the administration of the forest reserves was transferred from
the Department of the Interior to the Department of Agriculture,
and their name changed to National Forests. No great additions to
the government timberlands have been made since that time. Small,
valuable areas have been added. Other undesirable tracts have
been cut off from the original reserves.
The growth of the Division of Forestry, now the United States
Forest Service, has been very remarkable since 1898, when it
consisted of only a few scientific workers and clerks. At
present it employs more than 2,600 workers, which number is
increased during the dangerous fire season to from 4,000 to 5,000
employees. The annual appropriations have been increased from
$28,500 to approximately $6,500,000. The annual income from Uncle
Sam's woodlands is also on the gain and now amounts to about
$5,000,000 yearly. This income results largely from the sale of
timber and the grazing of livestock on the National Forests.
CHAPTER IX
OUR NATIONAL FORESTS
Our National Forests include 147 distinct and separate bodies of
timber in twenty-seven different states and in Alaska and Porto
Rico. They cover more than 156,000,000 acres. If they could be
massed together in one huge area like the state of Texas, it
would make easier the task of handling the forests and fighting
fires. The United States Forest Service, which has charge of
their management and protection, is one of the largest and most
efficient organizations of its kind in the world. It employs
expert foresters, scientists, rangers and clerks.
The business of running the forest is centred in eight district
offices located in different parts of the country with a general
headquarters at Washington, D.C. These districts are in charge of
district foresters and their assistants.
The district headquarters and the States that they look after
are:
No. 1. Northern District, Missoula, Montana.
(Montana, northeastern Washington,
northern Idaho, and northwestern South
Dakota.)
No. 2. Rocky Mountain District, Denver, Colorado.
(Colorado, Wyoming, the remainder
of South Dakota, Nebraska, northern
Michigan, and northern Minnesota.)
No. 3. Southwestern District, Albuquerque,
New Mexico. (Most of Arizona and New
Mexico.)
No. 4. Intermountain District, Ogden, Utah.
(Utah, southern Idaho, western Wyoming,
eastern and central Nevada, and
northwestern Arizona.)
No. 5. California District, San Francisco, California.
(California and southwestern Nevada.)
No. 6. North Pacific District, Portland, Oregon.
(Washington and Oregon.)
No. 7. Eastern District, Washington, D.C.
(Arkansas, Alabama, Florida, Oklahoma,
North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia,
Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia, New
Hampshire, Maine, and Porto Rico.)
No. 8. Alaska District, Juneau, Alaska.
(Alaska.)
Each of the National Forests is under the direct supervision of
a forest supervisor and is split up into from 5 to 10 or more
ranger districts. Each ranger district is in charge of a forest
ranger who has an area of from 100,000 to 200,000 acres in his
charge.
The National Forests are, for the most part, located in the
mountainous region of the West, with small scattered areas in the
Lake States, and the White Mountains, Southern Appalachians and
Ozarks of the Eastern and Southern States. Many of them are a
wilderness of dense timber. It is a huge task to protect these
forests against the ravages of fire. Fire fighting takes
precedence over all other work in the National Forests. Lookout
stations are established on high points to watch for signs of
fire. Airplanes are used on fire patrol over great areas of
forest. Where railroads pass through the National Forests,
rangers operate motor cars and hand-cars over the tracks in their
patrol work. Launches are used in Alaska and on some of the
forests where there are large lakes, to enable the fire fighters
and forest guardians to cover their beats quickly. Every year the
National Forests are being improved and made more accessible by
the building of permanent roads, trails and telephone lines.
Special trails are built to and in the fire protection areas of
remote sections. A network of good roads is constructed in every
forest to improve fire fighting activities as well as to afford
better means of communication between towns, settlements
and farms. The road and trail plan followed in the National
Forests is mapped out years in advance. In the more remote
sections, trails are first constructed. Later, these trails may
be developed into wagon or motor roads. Congress annually
appropriates large sums of money for the building of roads in
the National Forests. Over 25,000 miles of roads and 35,000
miles of trails have already been constructed in these forests.
Communication throughout the National Forests is had by the use
of the telephone and the radio or wireless telephone. Signalling
by means of the heliograph is practiced on bright days in regions
that have no telephones. Arrangements made with private telephone
companies permit the forest officers to use their lines. The
efficient communication systems aid in the administration of the
forests and speeds the work of gathering fire fighters quickly at
the points where smoke is detected.
Agricultural and forestry experts have surveyed the lands in the
National Forests. Thus they have prevented the use of lands for
forestry purposes which are better adapted for farming. Since
1910, more than 26,500,000 acres of lands have been excluded from
the forests. These lands were more useful for farming or grazing
than for forestry. Practically all lands within the National
Forests have now been examined and classified. At intervals
Congress has combined several areas of forest lands into single
tracts. Government lands outside the National Forests have also
been traded for state or private lands within their boundaries.
Thus the forests have been lined-up in more compact bodies.
Careful surveys are made before such trades are closed to make
sure that the land given to Uncle Sam is valuable for timber
production and the protection of stream flow, and that the
Government receives full value for the land that is exchanged.
The National Forests contain nearly five hundred billion board
feet of merchantable timber. This is 23 per cent. of the
remaining timber in the country. Whenever the trees in the forest
reach maturity they are sold and put to use. All green trees to
be cut are selected by qualified forest officers and blazed and
marked with a "U.S." This marking is done carefully so as to
protect the forest and insure a future crop of trees on the area.
Timber is furnished at low rates to local farmers, settlers, and
stockmen for use in making improvements. Much fire wood and dead
and down timber also is given away. The removal of such material
lessens the fire danger in the forest.
Over a billion feet of timber, valued at more than $3,000,000, is
sold annually from the National Forests.
One generally does not think of meat, leather and wool as forest
crops. Nevertheless, the National Forests play an important part
in the western livestock industry. Experts report that over
one-fifth of the cattle and one-half of the sheep of the western
states are grazed in the National Forests. These livestock are
estimated to be worth nearly one-quarter billion dollars. More
than 9,500,000 head of livestock are pastured annually under
permit in the Federal forests. In addition, some 4,000,000 to
6,000,000 calves and lambs are grazed free of charge.
[Illustration: SEED BEDS IN A FOREST NURSERY]
The ranges suitable for stock grazing are used to pasture sheep,
cattle, horses, hogs and goats. The Secretary of Agriculture
decides what number and what kind of animals shall graze on each
forest. He regulates the grazing and prevents injury to the
ranges from being overstocked with too many cattle and sheep. The
forest ranges are divided into grazing units. Generally, the
cattle and horses are grazed in the valleys and on the lower
slopes of the mountain. The sheep and goats are pastured on the
high mountain sides and in the grassy meadows at or above
timberline.
Preferences to graze live stock on the forest ranges are for the
most part granted to stockmen who own improved ranch property and
live in or near one of the National Forests. The fee for grazing
on forest ranges is based on a yearlong rate of $1.20 a head of
cattle, $1.50 for horses, $.90 for hogs and $.30 a head for
sheep.
At times it is necessary, for short periods, to prohibit grazing
on the Government forest ranges. For example, when mature timber
has been cut from certain areas, it is essential that sheep be
kept off such tracts until the young growth has made a good start
in natural reforestation. Camping grounds needed for recreation
purposes by the public are excluded from the grazing range. If a
shortage of the water supply of a neighboring town or city
threatens, or if floods or erosion become serious due to fire or
overgrazing of the land, the range is closed to live-stock and
allowed to recuperate. Where artificial planting is practiced,
grazing is often forbidden until the young trees get a good
start.
The total receipts which Uncle Sam collects from the 30,000 or
more stockmen who graze their cattle and sheep on the National
Forests amount to nearly $2,500,000 annually. As a result of the
teachings of the Forest Service, the stockmen are now raising
better livestock. Improved breeding animals are kept in the herds
and flocks. Many of the fat stock now go directly from the range
to the market. Formerly, most of the animals had to be fed on
corn and grain in some of the Middle Western States to flesh them
for market. Experiments have been carried on which have shown the
advantages of new feeding and herding methods. The ranchers have
banded together in livestock associations, which coöperate with
the Forest Service in managing the forest ranges.
It costs about $5 to sow one acre of ground to tree seed, and
approximately $10 an acre to set out seedling trees. The seed is
obtained from the same locality where it is to be planted. In
many instances, cones are purchased from settlers who make a
business of gathering them. The Federal foresters dry these cones
in the sun and thresh out the seed, which they then fan and
clean. If it is desired to store supplies of tree seed from year
to year it is kept in sacks or jars, in a cool, dry place,
protected from rats and mice. Where seed is sown directly on the
ground, poison bait must be scattered over the area in order to
destroy the gophers, mice and chipmunks which otherwise would eat
the seed. Sowing seed broadcast on unprepared land has usually
failed unless the soil and weather conditions were just right.
For the most part, setting out nursery seedlings has given better
results than direct seeding. Two men can set out between five
hundred and one thousand trees a day.
The National Forests contain about one million acres of denuded
forest lands. Much of this was cut-over and so severely burned
before the creation of the forests that it bears no tree growth.
Some of these lands will reseed themselves naturally while other
areas have to be seeded or planted by hand. In this way the lands
that will produce profitable trees are fitted to support forest
cover. Because the soils and climate of our National Forests are
different, special experiments have been carried on in different
places to decide the best practices to follow. Two method of
reforestation are commonly practiced. In some places, the tree
seed is sown directly upon the ground and, thereafter, may or may
not be cultivated. This method is limited to the localities where
the soil and moisture conditions are favorable for rapid growth.
Under the other plan, the seedlings are grown in nurseries for
several years under favorable conditions. They are then moved to
the field and set out in permanent plantations.
CHAPTER X
THE NATIONAL FORESTS OF ALASKA
There are two great National Forests in Alaska. They cover
20,579,740 acres or about 5-1/2 per cent. of the total area of
Alaska. The larger of these woodlands, the Tongass National
Forest, is estimated to contain 70,000,000,000 board feet of
timber ripe for marketing. Stands of 100,000 board feet per acre
are not infrequent. This is the Alaskan forest that will some day
be shipping large amounts of timber to the States. It has over
12,000 miles of shore line and ninety per cent. of the usable
timber is within two miles of tidewater. This makes it easy to
log the timber and load the lumber directly from the forests to
the steamers. This forest is 1500 miles closer to the mainland
markets than is the other Alaskan National Forest.
In most of the National Forests the rangers ride around their
beats on horseback. The foresters in the Tongass use motor boats.
They travel in couples; two men to a 35-foot boat, which is
provided with comfortable eating and sleeping quarters. The
rangers live on the boat all the time. During the summer they
work sixteen to twenty hours daily. The days are long and the
nights short, and they must travel long distances between points
of work. On such runs one man steers the boat and watches the
forested shoreline for three or four hours at a time, while his
mate reads or sleeps; then they change off. In this way, they are
able to make the most efficient use of the long periods of
daylight.
The other big timberland in Alaska is the Chugach National
Forest. It is a smaller edition of the Tongass Forest. Its trees
are not so large and the stand of timber only about one-half as
heavy as in the Tongass. Experts estimate that it contains
7,000,000,000 board feet of lumber. Western hemlock predominates.
There is also much spruce, poplar and birch. Stands of 40,000 to
50,000 feet of lumber an acre are not unusual. In the future, the
lumber of the Chugach National Forest will play an important part
in the industrial life of Alaska. Even now, it is used by the
fishing, mining, railroad and agricultural interests. On account
of its great distance from the markets of the Pacific Northwest
it will be a long time before lumber from this forest will be
exported.
The timber in the Tongass National Forest runs 60 per cent.
western hemlock and 20 per cent. Sitka spruce. The other 20 per
cent. consists of western red cedar, yellow cypress, lodge-pole
pine, cottonwood and white fir. The yellow cypress is very
valuable for cabinet making. All these species except the
cedar are suitable for pulp manufacture. Peculiarly enough,
considerable of the lumber used in Alaska for box shooks in the
canneries and in building work is imported from the United
States. The local residents do not think their native timber is
as good as that which they import.
Alaska will probably develop into one of the principal paper
sources of the United States. Our National Forests in Alaska
contain approximately 100,000,000 cords of timber suitable for
paper manufacture. Experts report that these forests could
produce 2,000,000 cords of pulpwood annually for centuries
without depletion. About 6,000,000 tons of pulpwood annually are
now required to keep us supplied with enough paper. The Tongass
National Forest could easily supply one-third of this amount
indefinitely. This forest is also rich in water power. It would
take more than 250,000 horses to produce as much power as that
which the streams and rivers of southern Alaska supply.
The western hemlock and Sitka spruce are the best for paper
making. The spruce trees are generally sound and of good quality.
The hemlock trees are not so good, being subject to decay at the
butts. This often causes fluted trunks. The butt logs from such
trees usually are inferior. This defect in the hemlock reduces
its market value to about one-half that of the spruce for paper
making. Some of the paper mills in British Columbia are now using
these species of pulpwood and report that they make high-grade
paper.
The pulp logs are floated down to the paper mill. In the mill the
bark is removed from the logs. Special knives remove all the
knots and cut the logs into pieces twelve inches long and six
inches thick. These sticks then pass into a powerful grinding
machine which tears them into small chips. The chips are cooked
in special steamers until they are soft. The softened chips are
beaten to pieces in large vats until they form a pasty pulp. The
pulp is spread over an endless belt of woven wire cloth of small
mesh. The water runs off and leaves a sheet of wet pulp which
then is run between a large number of heated and polished steel
cylinders which press and dry the pulp into sheets of paper.
Finally, it is wound into large rolls ready for commercial use.
If a pulp and paper industry is built up in Alaska, it will be of
great benefit to that northern country. It will increase the
population by creating a demand for more labor. It will aid the
farming operations by making a home market for their products. It
will improve transportation and develop all kinds of business.
Altogether 420,000,000 feet of lumber have been cut and sold from
the national forests of Alaska in the past ten years. This
material has been made into such products as piling, saw logs and
shingle bolts. All this lumber has been used in Alaska and none
of it has been exported. Much of the timber was cut so that it
would fall almost into tide-water. Then the logs were fastened
together in rafts and towed to the sawmills. One typical raft of
logs contained more than 1,500,000 feet of lumber. It is not
unusual for spruce trees in Alaska to attain a diameter of from
six to nine feet and to contain 10,000 or 15,000 feet of lumber.
Southeastern Alaska has many deep-water harbors which are open
the year round. Practically all the timber in that section is
controlled by the Government and is within the Tongass National
Forest. This means that this important crop will be handled
properly. No waste of material will occur. Cutting will be
permitted only where the good of the forest justifies such work.
CHAPTER XI
PROGRESS IN STATE FORESTRY
The rapid depletion and threatened exhaustion of the timber
supply in the more thickly populated sections of the East has
prompted several of the states to initiate action looking toward
the conservation of their timber resources. As far back as 1880,
a forestry commission was appointed in New Hampshire to formulate
a forest policy for the State. Vermont took similar action two
years later, followed within the next few years by many of the
northeastern and lake states.
These commissions were mainly boards of inquiry, for the purpose
of gathering reliable information upon which to report, with
recommendations, for the adoption of a state forest policy. As a
result of the inquiries, forestry departments were established in
a number of states. The report of the New York Commission of 1884
resulted in forest legislation, in 1885, creating a forestry
department and providing for the acquisition of state forests.
Liberal appropriations were made from time to time for this
purpose, until now the state forests embrace nearly 2,000,000
acres, the largest of any single state.
New York state forests were created, especially, for the
protection of the Adirondack and Catskill regions as great
camping and hunting grounds, and not for timber production. The
people of the state were so fearful that through political
manipulation this vast forest resource might fall into the hands
of the timber exploiters, that a constitutional amendment was
proposed and adopted, absolutely prohibiting the cutting of green
timber from the state lands. Thus, while New York owns large
areas of state forest land, it is unproductive so far as
furnishing timber supplies to the state is concerned. It is held
distinctly for the recreation it affords to campers and hunters,
and contains many famous summer resorts.
State forestry in Pennsylvania began in 1887, when a commission
was appointed to study conditions, resulting in the establishment
of a Commission of Forestry in 1895. Two years later, an act was
passed providing for the purchase of state forests. At the
present time, Pennsylvania has 1,250,000 acres of state forest
land. Unlike those of New York, Pennsylvania forests were
acquired and are managed primarily for timber production,
although the recreational uses are not overlooked.
The large areas of state-owned lands in the Lake States suitable,
mainly, for timber growing, enabled this section to create
extensive state forests without the necessity of purchase as was
the case in New York and Pennsylvania. As a result, Wisconsin has
nearly 400,000 acres of state forest land, Minnesota, about
330,000, and Michigan, about 200,000 acres. South Dakota, with a
relatively small area of forest land, has set aside 80,000 acres
for state forest. A number of other states have initiated a
policy of acquiring state forest lands, notably, New Hampshire,
Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Jersey, Maryland, and
Indiana, each with small areas, but likely to be greatly
increased within the next few years under the development of
present policies. Other states are falling in line with this
forward movement. There are but 4,237,587 acres in state forests
in the United States. This is only 1-1/2 per cent. of the
cut-over and denuded land in the country which is useful only for
tree production. The lack of funds prevents many states from
embarking more extensively in this work. Many states set aside
only a few thousand a year; others, that are more progressive and
realize the need of forestry extension, spend annually from one
hundred thousand to five hundred thousand dollars. Foresters are,
generally, agreed that as much as 25 per cent. of the forest land
of every state should be publicly owned for producing large sized
timber, requiring seventy-five to one hundred years to grow, and
which the private owner would not be interested in producing.
National, state, or communal forests must supply it. All of these
combined comprise a very small part of the forests of most of the
states, so that much larger areas must be acquired by the states
and the national government to safeguard our future timber
supplies.
Not less than thirty-two states are actually engaged in state
forestry work. Many of them have well-organized forestry
departments, which, in states like New York and Pennsylvania,
having large areas of state forests, are devoted largely to the
care and protection of these lands. In other states having no
state forests, the work is largely educational in character.
The most notable progress in forestry has been made in fire
protection. All states having forestry departments lay especial
emphasis upon forest protection, since it is recognized that only
by protecting the forests from fire is it possible to succeed in
growing timber crops. In fact, in most cases, the prevention of
fire in itself is sufficient to insure re-growth and productive
forests. Pennsylvania is spending $500,000 annually in protecting
her forests from fire. The coöperation of the Federal Government,
under a provision of the Weeks Law which appropriates small sums
of money for forest protection, provided the state will
appropriate an equal or greater amount, has done much to
encourage the establishment of systems of forest protection in
many of the states.
[Illustration: SOWING FOREST SEED IN AN EFFORT TO GROW A NEW
FOREST]
The enormous areas of denuded, or waste land in the various
states, comprising more than 80,000,000 acres, which can be made
again productive only by forest planting, present another big
problem in state forestry. Many of the states have established
state forestry nurseries for the growing of tree seedlings to
plant up these lands. The trees are either given away, or sold at
cost, millions being distributed each year, indicating a live
interest and growing sentiment in re-foresting waste lands.
The appalling waste of timber resources through excessive and
reckless cutting, amounting to forest devastation, is deplorable,
but we are helpless to prevent it. Since the bulk of woodlands
are privately owned, and there are no effective laws limiting the
cutting of timber with a view to conserving the supply, the only
means of bringing about regulated cutting on private lands is
through coöperation with the owners. This is being done in some
of the states in a limited way, through educational methods,
involving investigations, reports, demonstrations, and other
means of bringing improved forestry practices to the attention of
existing owners and enlisting their coöperation and support in
forest conservation.
Forestry in the state, or in the nation, seems to progress no
more rapidly than the timber disappears; in fact, the individual
states do not take precaution to conserve their timber supplies
until exhaustion is threatened. The damage has been largely done
before the remedy is considered. We are today paying a tremendous
toll for our lack of foresight in these matters. As a timber
producing state becomes a timber importing state, (a condition
existing in most of the eastern and middle states) we begin to
pay a heavy toll in the loss of home industries dependent upon
wood, and also in heavy freight charges on lumber that we must
import from distant points to supply our needs. In many states,
the expenditure of an amount for reforestation and fire
protection equal to this freight bill on imported lumber would
make the state self-supporting in a decade, instead of becoming
worse off each year.
Marked progress has been made along the lines indicated, but
few of the states have begun to measure up to their full
responsibility in protecting their future timber supply.
CHAPTER XII
THE PLAYGROUNDS OF THE NATION
The public forests are steadily increasing in popularity as the
playgrounds of the Nation. The woodlands offer splendid
opportunities for camping, hunting, fishing and outdoor life.
Millions of motorists now spend their vacations in the government
and state forests. Railroads and automobiles make the forests
accessible to all. Thousands of miles of improved motor highways
lead into the very heart of the hills. More than 5,500,000 people
annually visit the National Forests. Of this number, some
2,500,000 are campers, fishermen and hunters.
[Illustration: A CAMPING GROUND IN A NATIONAL FOREST]
The forests provide cheap health insurance to all who will enjoy
what they offer in sport and recreation. For example, over
1,000,000 vacationists visit Colorado's forests each year. If
each person spent but five days in the forests, this would mean a
total of 5,000,000 days or 50,000,000 hours of rest and
enjoyment. Recreation at the beaches and amusement parks costs at
least fifty cents an hour. Applying that rate to the free fun
which the people get out of the forests, in Colorado in one
year the tourists, campers and fishermen gained $25,000,000 worth
of pleasure from the forests.
The National and State Forests furnish summer homes for thousands
of people who live in the neighboring cities and towns. Regular
summer home sites are laid off in many of the forests. Usually
these individual sites cover about one-quarter acre or less. They
rent for $5 to $25 a year, depending on the location. A man can
rent one of these camp grounds for a term of years. He can build
a summer cottage or bungalow on it. There are no special rules
about the size or cost of the houses. Uncle Sam requires only
that the cottages be sightly and the surroundings be kept clean
and sanitary. Many of the cabins are built for $150 to $300. Some
of them are more permanent and cost from $3,000 to $5,000 or
$10,000. In the Angeles National Forest in southern California,
over sixteen hundred of these cottages are now in use and many
more are being built.
Where there are dead or mature trees in the forest, near summer
home sites, timber can be purchased at low prices for use in
building cottages. Even the people of small means can build
cabins in the forests and enjoy living in the mountains during
the heat of the summer. These camps provide fine surroundings for
the rompings and summer games of the children and young people.
In California a number of cities have set up municipal camps in
the National Forests. At very low costs, the city residents can
spend their vacations at these camps. Tents and cottages are
provided. Facilities for all kinds of games and sports furnish
recreation. Each family may stay at the camp for two weeks. The
expenses are so low for meals and tents that the municipal camps
furnish the best and cheapest vacation which the family of
limited means can enjoy. These camps are very popular. Wherever
they have been tried, they have been successful. There are twelve
municipal camps in California. They cost $150,000.
Fine automobile camps are maintained along many of the important
National and State Forest highways for the use of tourists.
Concrete fireplaces, tables, benches and running water are
provided at these wayside camping places. The tourists who carry
their camp kits like to stop at these automobile camps. They
meet many other tourists and exchange information about the best
trails to follow and the condition of the roads. Sometimes,
permanent cabins and shelters are provided for the use of the
cross-country travelers. The only rules are that care be
exercised in the use of fire and the camping sites be kept in
clean and sanitary condition.
All the forest roads are posted with many signs asking the
tourists to be careful in the use of matches, tobacco and camp
fires, so as not to start destructive forest fires. In the
Federal and State forests hundreds of man-caused fires occur
annually, due to the neglect and carelessness of campers and
tourists to put out their camp fires. A single match or a
cigarette stub tossed from a passing automobile may start a
costly fire. During the season from May to October, the western
forests usually are as dry as tinder. Rains are rare during that
period. A fire once started runs riot unless efficient control
measures are used at once.
Those interested in fishing and hunting usually can find plenty
of chance to pursue their favorite sports in the National and
State Forests. There is good fishing in the forest streams and
lakes, as the rangers, working in coöperation with Federal and
State hatcheries yearly restock important waters. Fishing and
hunting in the National Forests are regulated by the fish and
game laws of that state in which the forests are located. The
killing of wild game is permitted during certain open seasons in
most of the forest regions.
[Illustration: GOOD FORESTS MEAN GOOD HUNTING AND FISHING]
The eastern forests in the White Mountains, the Adirondacks, and
the Appalachians, are not, for the most part, as well developed
as recreation grounds as are the western vacation lands. However,
more interest is being taken each year in the outdoor life
features of the eastern forests, and ultimately they will be used
on a large scale as summer camp grounds. Many hikers and campers
now spend their annual vacations in these forests. Throughout the
White Mountain forest of New Hampshire, regular trails for
walking parties have been made. At frequent intervals simple
camps for the use of travelers have been built by mountaineering
clubs. This forest, located as it is near centres of large
population is visited by a half-million tourists each season. The
Pisgah National Forest of North Carolina is becoming a centre for
automobile travel as it contains a fine macadam road. The
Superior National Forest of Minnesota, which covers 1,250,000
acres and contains 150,000 acres of lakes, is becoming very
popular. It is called "the land of ten thousand lakes." One can
travel in a canoe through this forest for a month at a time
without passing over the same lake twice. Other popular national
forests are the Angeles in southern California, the Pike and
Colorado in Colorado, and the Oregon and Wenatchee--the Pacific
Northwest. Visitors to these forests total more than 1,750,000 a
year.
The western forests are also being used for winter sports. They
furnish excellent conditions for snow-shoe trips, skiing and
sledding. The people who have camps on government land use their
places for week-end excursions during the snow season when the
roads are passable. The White Mountain National Forest is used
more for winter sports than any other government woodland. At
many of the towns of New Hampshire and Maine, huge carnivals are
held each winter. Championship contests in skiing, snowshoeing,
skating, ski jumping, tobogganing and ski-joring are held. Snow
sport games are also annual events in the Routt, Leadville and
Pike National Forests of Colorado. Cross country ski races and
ski-joring contests are also held. In the Truckee National Forest
of California, dog-team races over courses of 25 to 50 miles are
held each winter.
About eighty per cent. of the 5,500,000 people who visit the
National Forests are automobile tourists. The other twenty per
cent. consists of sportsmen interested in hunting, fishing,
canoeing, boating, mountain climbing, bathing, riding and hiking.
In the Pacific Coast States there are a number of mountain
climbing clubs whose members compete with each other in making
difficult ascents. The mountaineering clubs of Portland, Oregon,
for example, stage an interesting contest each summer in climbing
Mount Hood, one of the highest peaks in the country.
CHAPTER XIII
SOLVING OUR FORESTRY PROBLEMS
A system of forestry which will provide sufficient lumber for the
needs of our country and keep our forest land productive must be
built on the extension of our public forests. Our National
Forests are, at present, the one bright feature of future
lumbering. Their tree crops will never be cut faster than they
can be grown. A balance between production and consumption will
always be maintained. Our needs for more timber, the necessity
for protecting the headwaters of streams, the demands for saving
wild life, and the playground possibilities of our forests
justify their extension. Approximately eighty per cent of the
American forests are now privately owned. The chances are that
most of these wooded tracts will always remain in the hands of
private owners. It is important that the production of these
forests be kept up without injuring their future value. We must
prepare for the lumber demands of many years from now.
Some method must be worked out of harnessing our idle forest
lands and putting them to work growing timber. Any regulations
that are imposed on the private owners of woodlands must be
reasonable. Changes in our present methods of taxing timberlands
must be made to encourage reforestation. The public must aid the
private individuals in fighting forest fires, the greatest menace
that modern forestry has to face. A national policy is needed
which will permit the private owner to grow trees which will give
him fair and reasonable profit when sold.
The farmers of this country use about one-half of all the lumber
consumed annually. They own approximately 191,000,000 acres of
timber in their farm woodlots. If farmers would devote a little
time and labor to the permanent upkeep and improvement of their
timber, they would aid in decreasing the danger of a future
lumber famine. If they would but keep track of the acreage
production of their woodlands as closely as they do of their corn
and wheat crops, American forestry would benefit greatly.
Between 1908 and 1913, the U.S. Forest Service established two
forest experiment stations in California and one each in
Washington, Idaho, Colorado, and Arizona. They devote the same
degree of science and skill to the solution of tree growing and
lumbering problems as the agricultural experiment stations give
to questions of farm and crop management. Despite the fact that
these forestry stations did fine work for the sections that they
served, recently a number of them had to close, due to lack of
funds. Congress does not yet realize the importance of this work.
More forest experiment stations are needed throughout the
country. Such problems as what kinds of trees are best to grow,
must be solved. Of the 495 species of trees in this country, 125
are important commercially. They all differ in their histories,
characteristics and requirements. Research and study should be
made of these trees in the sections where they grow best. Our
knowledge regarding tree planting and the peculiarities of the
different species is, as yet, very meagre. We must discover the
best methods of cutting trees and of disposing of the slash. We
must investigate rates of growth, yields and other problems of
forest management. We must study the effect of climate on forest
fires. We must continue experiments in order to develop better
systems of fire protection.
We need more forest experiment stations to promote the
production of more timber. Twenty of our leading industries
utilize lumber as their most important raw material. Fifty-five
different industries use specialized grades and quality of
lumber in the manufacture of many products. This use of lumber
includes general mill work and planing mill products, such as
building crates and boxes, vehicles, railroad cars, furniture,
agricultural implements and wooden ware.
Our manufacturers make and use more than two hundred and
seventy-five different kinds of paper, including newsprint,
boxboard, building papers, book papers and many kinds of
specialty papers. The forest experiment stations would help solve
the practical problems of these many industries. They could work
out methods by which to maintain our forests and still turn out
the thirty-five to forty billion board feet of lumber used each
year. They are needed to determine methods of increasing our
annual cut for pulp and paper. They are necessary so that we can
increase our annual output of poles, pilings, cooperage and
veneer.
A forest experiment station is needed in the southern pine belt.
The large pine forests of Dixieland have been shaved down from
130,000,000 acres to 23,500,000 acres. In that region there are
more than 30,000,000 acres of waste forest lands which should be
reclaimed and devoted to the growing of trees. Eastern and middle
western manufacturing and lumbering centres are interested in the
restoring of the southern pine forests. During the last score of
years, they have used two-thirds of the annual output of those
forests. In another ten to fifteen years home demand will use
most of the pine cut in the South. The East and Middle West will
then have to rely mostly on the Pacific Coast forests for their
pine lumber.
The Lake States need a forest experiment station to work out
methods by which the white pine, hemlock, spruce, beech, birch
and maple forests of that section can be renewed. The Lake States
are now producing only one-ninth as much white pine as they were
thirty years ago. These states now cut only 3,500,000,000 feet of
all kinds of lumber annually. Their output is growing smaller
each year. Wisconsin led the United States in lumber production
in 1900. Now she cuts less than the second-growth yield of Maine.
Michigan, which led in lumber production before Wisconsin, now
harvests a crop of white pine that is 50 per cent. smaller than
that of Massachusetts. Experts believe that a forest experiment
station in the Lake States would stimulate production so that
enough lumber could be produced to satisfy the local demands.
Not least in importance among the forest regions requiring an
experiment station are the New England States and northern and
eastern New York. In that section there are approximately
25,000,000 acres of forest lands. Five and one-half million acres
consist of waste and idle land. Eight million acres grow nothing
but fuel-wood. The rest of the timber tracts are not producing
anywhere near their capacity. New England produces 30 per cent.
and New York 50 per cent. of our newsprint. Maine is the leading
state in pulp production. New England imports 50 per cent. of her
lumber, while New York cuts less than one-half the timber she
annually consumes.
Another experiment station should be provided to study the
forestry problems of Pennsylvania, southern and western New York,
Ohio, Maryland, New Jersey and Delaware. At one time this region
was the most important lumber centre of the United States.
Pennsylvania spends $100,000,000 a year in importing lumber which
should be grown at home. The denuded and waste lands at the
headwaters of the Allegheny River now extend over one-half
million acres. New Jersey is using more than twenty times as much
lumber as is produced in the state. Ohio is a centre for wood
manufacturing industries, yet her timber-producing possibilities
are neglected, as are those of other states needing wood for
similar purposes.
European nations have spent large sums of money in investigating
forestry problems to make timber producing economically feasible,
and have found that it paid. In this country, our forest
experiment stations will have to deal with a timbered area twice
that of all Europe, exclusive of Russia. That is why we shall
need many of these stations to help solve the many questions of
national welfare which are so dependent upon our forests.
CHAPTER XIV
WHY THE UNITED STATES SHOULD PRACTICE FORESTRY
Of late years the demand for lumber by the world trade has been
very great. Most of the countries which have extensive forests
are taking steps to protect their supplies. They limit cutting
and restrict exports of timber. Both New Zealand and Switzerland
have passed laws of this kind. Sweden exports much lumber, but by
law forbids the cutting of timber in excess of the annual growth.
Norway regulates private cutting. England is planning to plant
1,770,000 acres of new forest reserve. This body of timber when
ready for cutting, would be sufficient to supply her home needs
in time of emergency for at least three years. France is
enlarging her forest nurseries and protecting her timber in every
possible way. Even Russia, a country with huge forest tracts, is
beginning to practice conservation. Russia now requires that all
timber cut under concession shall be replaced by plantings of
trees.
For many years, the United States and China were the greatest
wasters of forest resources under the sun. Now this country has
begun to practice scientific forestry on a large scale so that
China now has the worst-managed forests in the world. Japan, on
the other hand, handles her forests efficiently and has
established a national forestry school. Austria, Norway, Sweden
and Italy have devoted much time, labor and money to the
development of practical systems of forestry. Turkey, Greece,
Spain and Portugal, all follow sane and sensible forestry
practices. Even Russia takes care of her national timberlands and
annually draws enormous incomes from their maintenance. France
and Germany both have highly successful forestry systems.
Switzerland, Australia, and New Zealand are using their forests
in a practical manner and saving sufficient supplies of wood for
posterity.
History tells us that the forests first were protected as the
homes of wild game. Little attention was paid to the trees in
those days. The forests were places to hunt and abodes devoted to
wild animals. Scientific forestry was first studied and practised
widely in the nineteenth century. Its development and expansion
have been rapid. Germany still leads as one of the most
prominent countries that practices efficient forestry. German
forests are now said to be worth more than $5,000,000,000. France
has over 2,750,000 acres of fine publicly owned forests, in
addition to private forests, which yield a net income of more
than $2 an acre a year to the government. The French have led in
extending reforestation on denuded mountain sides. British India
has well-managed forests which cover over 200,000 square miles of
area. These timberlands return a net income of from $3,000,000 to
$4,000,000 a year. India now protects more than 35,000 square
miles of forest against fire at an annual cost of less than half
a cent an acre.
Forest experts say that the United States, which produces more
than one-half of all the sawed timber in the world, should pay
more attention to the export lumber business. Such trade must be
built up on the basis of a permanent supply of timber. This means
the practice of careful conservation and the replacement of
forests that have been destroyed. We can not export timber from
such meagre reserves as the pine forests of the South, which will
not supply even the domestic needs of the region for much more
than ten or fifteen years longer. Many of our timber men desire
to develop extensive export trade. Our sawmills are large enough
and numerous enough to cut much more timber annually than we need
in this country. However, the danger is that we shall only abuse
our forests the more and further deplete the timber reserves of
future generations as a result of extensive export trade. If such
trade is developed on a large scale, a conservative, practical
national forestry policy must be worked out, endorsed and lived
up to by every producing exporter.
The U.S. Forest Service reports that before the world war, we
were exporting annually 3,000,000,000 board feet of lumber and
sawlogs, not including ties, staves and similar material. This
material consisted of Southern yellow pine, Douglas fir, white
oak, redwood, white pine, yellow poplar, cypress, walnut,
hickory, ash, basswood and similar kinds of wood. The exports
were made up of 79 per cent. softwoods and 21 per cent.
hardwoods. The export trade consumed about 8-1/2 per cent. of our
annual lumber cut. Southern yellow pine was the most popular
timber shipped abroad. One-half of the total export was of this
material.
During the four years before the war our imports of lumber from
foreign countries amounted to about 1,200,000,000 board feet of
lumber and logs. In 1918, imports exceeded exports by 100,000,000
board feet. In addition to this lumber, we also shipped in,
largely from Canada, 1,370,000 cords of pulp wood, 596,000 tons
of wood pulp, 516,000 tons of paper, and close to a billion
shingles. Some of the material, such as wood pulp and paper, also
came from Sweden, Norway, Germany, Spain, the Netherlands and the
United Kingdom.
As a result of the war, European countries for several years
can use 7,000,000,000 feet of lumber a year above their
normal requirements. For housing construction, England
needs 2,000,000,000 feet a year more than normally; France,
1,500,000,000 feet; Italy, 1,750,000,000 feet; Belgium and Spain
750,000,000 feet apiece. Even before the war, there was a great
deficiency of timber in parts of Europe. It amounted to
16,000,000,000 board feet a year and was supplied by Russia, the
United States, Canada, Sweden, Austria-Hungary and a few other
countries of western Europe. If we can regulate cutting and
replenish our forests as they deserve, there is a remarkable
opportunity for us to build up a large and permanent export
trade.
[Illustration: YOUNG WHITE PINE SEEDED FROM ADJOINING PINE TREES]
The Central and South American countries now have to depend on
Canada, the United States and Sweden for most of their softwoods.
Unless they develop home forests by the practice of modern
forestry, they will always be dependent on imported timber of
this type. South Africa and Egypt are both heavy importers of
lumber. Africa has large tropical forests but the timber is hard
to get at and move. China produces but little lumber and needs
much. She is developing into a heavy importing country. Japan
grows only about enough timber to supply her home needs.
Australia imports softwoods from the United States and Canada.
New Zealand is in the market for Douglas fir and hardwoods.
In the past, our export lumber business has been second only to
that of Russia in total amount. The value of the timber that we
exported was larger than that of Russia because much of our
timber that was sent abroad consisted of the best grades of
material grown in this country. In the future, we shall have to
compete in the softwood export business with Russia, Finland,
Sweden, Norway and the various states of southeastern Europe
which sell lumber. In the hardwood business, we have only a
limited number of rivals. With the exception of a small section
of eastern Europe, our hardwood forests are the finest in the
Temperate Zone. We export hickory, black walnut, yellow poplar,
white and red oak even to Russia and Sweden, countries that are
our keenest rivals in the softwood export business.
Europe wants export lumber from our eastern states because the
transportation costs on such material are low. She does not like
to pay heavy costs of hauling timber from the Pacific Coast to
the Atlantic seaboard and then have it reshipped by water.
Our eastern forests are practically exhausted. Our supplies of
export lumber except Douglas fir are declining. Most of the kinds
of export timber that Europe wants we need right at home. We have
only about 258,000,000,000 feet of southern yellow pine left, yet
this material composes one-half of our annual shipments abroad.
We are cutting this material at the rate of 16,000,000,000 board
feet a year. Some authorities believe that our reserves will
last only sixteen years unless measures to protect them are put
into effect at once. At the present rate of cutting long-leaf
pine trees, our outputs of naval stores including turpentine and
rosin are dwindling. We cannot afford to increase our export of
southern yellow pine unless reforestation is started on all land
suitable for that purpose. Our pine lands of the southern states
must be restocked and made permanently productive. Then they
could maintain the turpentine industry, provide all the lumber of
this kind we need for home use, and supply a larger surplus for
export.
Although our supplies of Douglas fir, western white pine, sugar
pine and western yellow pine are still large, they will have to
bear an extra burden when all the southern pine is gone. This
indicates that the large supplies of these woods will not last as
long as we would wish. To prevent overtaxing their production, it
is essential that part of the load be passed to the southern pine
cut-over lands. By proper protection and renewal of our forests,
we can increase our production of lumber and still have a
permanent supply. The Forest Service estimates that by protecting
our cut-over and waste lands from fire and practicing care to
secure reproduction after logging on our remaining virgin forest
land, we can produce annually at least 27,750,000,000 cubic feet
of wood, including 70,000,000,000 board feet of sawtimber. Such a
production would meet indefinitely the needs of our growing
population, and still leave an amount of timber available for
export.
Our hardwoods need protection as well as our softwoods. Ten per
cent of our yearly cut of valuable white oak is shipped overseas.
In addition we annually waste much of our best oak in the
preparation of split staves for export. At the present rate of
cutting, the supply, it is said, will not last more than
twenty-five years. We ship abroad about seven per cent. of our
poplar lumber. Our supplies of this material will be exhausted in
about twenty years if the present rate of cutting continues. We
sell to foreign countries at least one-half of our cut of black
walnut which will be exhausted in ten to twelve years unless
present methods are reformed. Our supplies of hickory, ash and
basswood will be used up in twenty to thirty years. We need all
this hardwood lumber for future domestic purposes. However, the
furniture factories of France, Spain and Italy are behind on
orders. They need hardwood and much of our valuable hardwood
timber is being shipped to Europe.
Experience has proved that correct systems of handling the
private forests can not be secured by mere suggestions or
education. No ordinary method of public coöperation has been
worked out which produces the desired results. It is necessary
that suitable measures be adopted to induce private owners to
preserve and protect their woodlands. The timberlands must be
protected against forest fires. Timber must be cut so as to
aid natural reproduction of forest. Cut-over lands must be
reforested. If such methods were practiced, and national, state
and municipal forests were established and extended, our lumber
problem would largely solve itself. We not only should produce a
large permanent supply of timber for domestic use, but also
should have great reserves available for export. Under such
conditions, the United States would become the greatest supply
source in the world for lumber.
CHAPTER XV
WHY THE LUMBERMAN SHOULD PRACTICE FORESTRY
The lumber industry of this country can aid reforestation by
practicing better methods. It can harvest its annual crop of
timber without injuring the future production of the forests. It
can limit forest fires by leaving the woods in a safe condition
after it has removed the timber. Some private timber owners who
make a living out of cutting lumber, have even reached the stage
where they are planting trees. They are coming to appreciate the
need for replacing trees that they cut down, in order that new
growth may develop to furnish future timber crops.
The trouble in this country has been that the lumbermen have
harvested the crop of the forests in the shortest possible time
instead of spreading out the work over a long period. Most of our
privately owned forests have been temporarily ruined by practices
of this sort. The aim of the ordinary lumberman is to fell the
trees and reduce them to lumber with the least labor possible.
He does not exercise special care as to how the tree is cut down.
He pays little attention to the protection of young trees and new
growth. He cuts the tree to fall in the direction that best
serves his purpose, no matter whether this means that the forest
giant will crush and seriously cripple many young trees. He
wastes large parts of the trunk in cutting. He leaves the tops
and chips and branches scattered over the ground to dry out. They
develop into a fire trap.
As generally followed, the ordinary method of lumbering is
destructive of the forests. It ravages the future production of
the timberlands. It pays no heed to the young growth of the
forest. It does not provide for the proper growth and development
of the future forest. Our vast stretches of desolate and deserted
cut-over lands are silent witnesses to the ruin which has been
worked by the practice of destructive lumbering. Fortunately, a
change for the better is now developing. With the last of our
timberland riches in sight on the Pacific Coast, the lumbering
industry is coming to see that it must prepare for the future.
Consequently, operators are handling the woods better than ever
before. They now are trying to increase both the production and
permanent value of the remaining forests. They aim to harvest
the tree yield more thoroughly and to extend their cuttings over
many years. They appreciate that it is necessary to protect and
preserve the forest at the same time that profitable tree crops
are being removed. They see the need for saving and increasing
young growth and for protecting the woodlands against fire. If
only these methods of forestry had been observed from the time
the early settlers felled the first trees, not only would our
forests be producing at present all the lumber we could use, but
also the United States would be the greatest lumber-exporting
country in the world.
[Illustration: WHAT SOME KINDS OF TIMBER CUTTING DO TO A FOREST]
It will never be possible to stop timber cutting entirely in this
country, nor would it be desirable to do so. The demands for
building material, fuel, wood pulp and the like are too great to
permit of such a condition. The Nation would suffer if all forest
cutting was suspended. There is a vital need, however, of
perpetuating our remaining forests. Wasteful lumbering practices
should be stopped. Only trees that are ready for harvest should
be felled. They should be cut under conditions which will protect
the best interests and production of the timberlands. As a
class, our lumbermen are no more selfish or greedy than men in
many other branches of business. They have worked under peculiar
conditions in the United States. Our population was small as
compared with our vast forest resources. Conditions imposed in
France and Germany, where the population is so dense that more
conservative systems of lumbering are generally practiced, were
not always applicable in this country. Furthermore, our lumbermen
have known little about scientific forestry. This science is
comparatively new in America. All our forestry schools are still
in the early stages of their development. As lumbermen learn more
about the value of modern forestry they gradually are coming to
practice its principles.
The early lumbermen often made mistakes in estimating the timber
yields of the forests. They also neglected to provide for the
future production of the woodlands after the virgin timber was
removed. Those who followed in their steps have learned by these
errors what mistakes to avoid. Our lumbermen lead the world in
skill and ingenuity. They have worked out most efficient methods
of felling and logging the trees. Many foreign countries have
long practiced forestry and lumbering, yet their lumbermen
cannot compete with the Americans when it comes to a matter of
ingenuity in the woods. American woods and methods of logging are
peculiar. They would no more fit under European forest conditions
than would foreign systems be suitable in this country. American
lumbermen are slowly coming to devise and follow a combination
method which includes all the good points of foreign forestry
revised to apply to our conditions.
We can keep our remaining forests alive and piece out their
production over a long period if we practice conservation methods
generally throughout the country. Our remaining forests can be
lumbered according to the rules of practical forestry without
great expense to the owners. In the long run, they will realize
much larger returns from handling the woods in this way. This
work of saving the forests should begin at once. It should be
practiced in every state. Our cut-over and idle lands should be
put to work. Our forest lands should be handled just like fertile
farming lands that produce big crops. The farmer does not attempt
to take all the fertility out of the land in the harvest of one
bumper crop. He handles the field so that it will produce
profitable crops every season. He fertilizes the soil and tills
it so as to add to its productive power. Similarly, our forests
should be worked so that they will yield successive crops of
lumber year after year.
Lumbermen who own forests from which they desire to harvest a
timber crop should first of all survey the woods, or have some
experienced forester do this work, to decide on what trees should
be cut and the best methods of logging to follow. The trees to be
cut should be selected carefully and marked. The owner should
determine how best to protect the young and standing timber
during lumbering. He should decide on what plantings he will make
to replace the trees that are cut. He should survey and estimate
the future yield of the forest. He should study the young trees
and decide about when they will be ripe to cut and what they will
yield. From this information, he can determine his future income
from the forest and the best ways of handling the woodlands.
Under present conditions in this country, only those trees should
be cut from our forests which are mature and ready for the ax.
This means that the harvest must be made under conditions where
there are enough young trees to take the place of the full-grown
trees that are removed. Cutting is best done during the winter
when the trees are dormant. If the cutting is performed during
the spring or summer, the bark, twigs and leaves of the
surrounding young growth may be seriously damaged by the falling
trees. The trees should be cut as low to the ground as is
practicable, as high stumps waste valuable timber. Care should be
taken so that they will not break or split in falling. Trees
should be dropped so that they will not crush young seedlings and
sapling growth as they fall. It is no more difficult or costly to
throw a tree so that it will not injure young trees than it is to
drop it anywhere without regard for the future of the forest.
Directly after cutting, the fallen timber should be trimmed so as
to remove branches that are crushing down any young growth or
seedling. In some forests the young growth is so thick that it is
impossible to throw trees without falling them on some of these
baby trees which will spring back into place again if the heavy
branches are removed at once. The top of the tree should be
trimmed so that it will lie close to the ground. Under such
conditions it will rot rapidly and be less of a fire menace. The
dry tops of trees which lodge above the ground are most dangerous
sources of fire as they burn easily and rapidly.
The lumbermen can also aid the future development of the forests
by using care in skidding and hauling the logs to the yard or
mill. Care should be exercised in the logging operations not to
tear or damage the bark of trunks of standing timber. If
possible, only the trees of unimportant timber species should be
cut for making corduroy roads in the forests. This will be a
saving of valuable material.
In lumbering operations as practiced in this country, the logs
are usually moved to the sawmills on sleds or by means of logging
railroads. If streams are near by, the logs are run into the
water and floated to the mill. If the current is not swift
enough, special dams are built. Then when enough logs are
gathered for the drive, the dam is opened and the captive waters
flood away rapidly and carry the logs to the mill. On larger
streams and rivers, the logs are often fastened together in
rafts. Expert log drivers who ride on the tipping, rolling logs
in the raging river, guide the logs on these drives.
On arrival at the sawmill, the logs are reduced to lumber. Many
different kinds of saws are used in this work. One of the most
efficient is the circular saw which performs rapid work. It is so
wide in bite, however, that it wastes much wood in sawdust. For
example, in cutting four boards of one-inch lumber, an ordinary
circular saw wastes enough material to make a fifth board,
because it cuts an opening that is one-quarter of an inch in
width. Band saws, although they do not work at such high speed,
are replacing circular saws in many mills because they are less
wasteful of lumber. Although sawmills try to prevent waste of
wood by converting slabs and short pieces into laths and
shingles, large amounts of refuse, such as sawdust, slabs and
edgings, are burned each season. As a rule, only about one-third
of the tree is finally used for construction purposes, the
balance being wasted in one way or another.
CHAPTER XVI
WHY THE FARMER SHOULD PRACTICE FORESTRY
The tree crop is a profitable crop for the average farmer to
grow. Notwithstanding the comparatively sure and easy incomes
which result from the farm woodlands that are well managed,
farmers as a class neglect their timber. Not infrequently they
sell their timber on the stump at low rates through ignorance of
the real market value of the wood. In other cases, they do not
care for their woodlands properly. They cut without regard to
future growth. They do not pile the slashings and hence expose
the timber tracts to fire dangers. They convert young trees into
hewed crossties which would yield twice as great a return if
allowed to grow for four or five years longer and then be cut as
lumber.
Just to show how a small tract of trees will grow into money if
allowed to mature, the case of a three-acre side-hill pasture in
New England is interesting. Forty-four years ago the farmer who
owned this waste land dug up fourteen hundred seedling pines
which were growing in a clump and set them out on the sidehill.
Twenty years later the farmer died. His widow sold the three
acres of young pine for $300. Fifteen years later the woodlot
again changed hands for a consideration of $1,000, a lumber
company buying it. Today, this small body of pine woods contains
90,000 board feet of lumber worth at least $1,500 on the stump.
The farmer who set out the trees devoted about $35 worth of land
and labor to the miniature forest. Within a generation this
expenditure has grown into a valuable asset which yielded a
return of $34.09 a year on the investment.
[Illustration: ON POOR SOIL TREES SUCH AS THESE ARE MORE
PROFITABLE THAN FARM CROPS ]
A New York farmer who plays square with his woodland realizes a
continuous profit of $1 a day from a 115-acre timber tract. The
annual growth of this well-managed farm forest is .65 cords of
wood per acre, equivalent to 75 cords of wood--mostly tulip
poplar--a year. The farmer's profit amounts to $4.68 a cord, or a
total of $364.50 from the entire timber tract. Over in New
Hampshire, an associate sold a two-acre stand of white pine--this
was before the inflated war prices were in force--for $2,000 on
the stump. The total cut of this farm forest amounted to 254
cords equivalent to 170,000 board feet of lumber. This was an
average of about 85,000 feet an acre. The trees were between
eighty and eighty-five years old when felled. This indicates an
annual growth on each acre of about 1,000 feet of lumber. The
gross returns from the sale of the woodland crops amounted to
$12.20 an acre a year. These, of course, are not average
instances.
Farmers should prize their woodlands because they provide
building material for fences and farm outbuildings as well as for
general repairs. The farm woodland also supplies fuel for the
farm house. Any surplus materials can be sold in the form of
standing timber, sawlogs, posts, poles, crossties, pulpwood,
blocks or bolts. The farm forest also serves as a good windbreak
for the farm buildings. It supplies shelter for the livestock
during stormy weather and protects the soil against erosion.
During slack times, it provides profitable work for the farm
hands.
There are approximately one-fifth of a billion acres of farm
woodlands in the United States. In the eastern United States
there are about 169,000,000 acres of farmland forests. If these
woodlands could be joined together in a solid strip one hundred
miles wide, they would reach from New York to San Francisco. They
would amount to an area almost eight times as large as the
combined forests of France which furnished the bulk of the timber
used by the Allies during the World War.
In the North, the farm woodlands compose two-fifths of all the
forests. Altogether there are approximately 53,000,000 acres of
farm woodlots which yield a gross income of about $162,000,000
annually to their owners. Surveys show that in the New England
States more than 65 per cent. of the forested land is on farms,
while in Ohio, Indiana, Illinois and Iowa from 80 to 100 per
cent. of the timber tracts are on corn belt farms. Conditions in
the South also emphasize the importance of farm woods, as in this
region there are more than 125,000,000 acres which yield an
income of about $150,000,000 a year. In fact the woodlands on the
farms compose about 50 per cent. of all the forest lands south of
the Mason-Dixon line. In Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina,
Kentucky and Oklahoma, over 60 per cent. of all the forest land
is on farms.
The Government says timber raising is very profitable in the
Eastern States because there is plenty of cheap land which is
not suitable for farming, while the rainfall is abundant and
favors rapid tree growth. Furthermore, there are many large
cities which use enormous supplies of lumber. The transportation
facilities, both rail and water, are excellent. This section is a
long distance from the last of the virgin forests of the Pacific
Coast country.
The farms that reported at the last census sold an average of
about $82 worth of tree crop products a year. New York, North
Carolina, Virginia, Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, Kentucky,
Wisconsin and Pennsylvania each sold over $15,000,000 worth of
lumber and other forest products from their farm woodlots during
a single season. In 1918 the report showed that the farms of the
country burn up about 78,000,000 cords of firewood annually,
equal to approximately 11.5 cords of fuel a farm. The Southern
States burn more wood than the colder Northern States. In North
Carolina each farm consumes eighteen cords of fuel annually,
while the farms of South Carolina and Arkansas used seventeen
cords apiece, and those of Mississippi, Georgia, Tennessee,
Louisiana, and Kentucky from fifteen to sixteen cords. Even under
these conditions of extensive cordwood use, our farm woodlots
are producing only about one-third to one-half of the wood
supplies which they could grow if they were properly managed.
The farmer who appreciates the importance of caring for his home
forests is always interested in knowing how much timber will grow
on an acre during a period of twelve months. The Government
reports that where the farm woodlots are fully stocked with trees
and well-cared for, an acre of hardwoods will produce from
one-half to one cord of wood--a cord of wood is equal to about
500 board feet of lumber. A pine forest will produce from one to
two cords of wood an acre. The growth is greater in the warmer
southern climate than it is in the North where the growing season
is much shorter. Expert foresters say that posts and crossties
can be grown in from ten to thirty years and that most of the
rapid growing trees will make saw timber in between twenty and
forty years.
After the farm woodland is logged, a new stand of young trees
will develop from seeds or sprouts from the stumps. Farmers find
that it is profitable to harrow the ground in the cut-over
woodlands to aid natural reproduction, or to turn hogs into the
timber tract to rustle a living as these animals aid in
scattering the seed under favorable circumstances. It is also
noteworthy that the most vigorous sprouts come from the clean,
well-cut stumps from which the trees were cut during the late
fall, winter or early spring before the sap begins to flow. The
top of each stump should be cut slanting so that it will readily
shed water. The trees that reproduce by sprouts include the oak,
hickory, basswood, chestnut, gum, cottonwood, willows and young
short-leaf and pitch pines.
In order that the farm woodland may be kept in the best of
productive condition, the farmer should remove for firewood the
trees adapted only for that purpose. Usually, removing these
trees improves the growth of the remaining trees by giving them
better chances to develop. Trees should be cut whose growth has
been stunted because trees of more rapid growth crowded them out.
Diseased trees or those that have been seriously injured by
insects should be felled. In sections exposed to chestnut blight
or gypsy moth infection, it is advisable to remove the chestnut
and birch trees before they are damaged seriously. It is wise
management to cut the fire-scarred trees as well as those that
are crooked, large-crowned and short-boled, as they will not make
good lumber. The removal of these undesirable trees improves the
forest by providing more growing space for the sturdy, healthy
trees. Sound dead trees as well as the slow-growing trees that
crowd the fast growing varieties should be cut. In addition,
where such less valuable trees as the beech, birch, black oak,
jack oak or black gum are crowding valuable trees like the sugar
maples, white or short-leaf pines, yellow poplar or white oak,
the former species should be chopped down. These cutting
operations should be done with the least possible damage to the
living and young trees. The "weed trees" should be cut down, just
as the weeds are hoed out of a field of corn, in order that the
surviving trees may make better growth.
Often the farmer errs in marketing his tree crops. There have
been numerous instances where farmers have been deluded by timber
cruisers and others who purchased their valuable forest tracts
for a mere fraction of what the woodlands were really worth. The
United States Forest Service and State Forestry Departments have
investigated many of these cases and its experts advise farmers
who are planning to sell tree crops to get prices for the various
wood products from as many sawmills and wood-using plants as
possible. The foresters recommend that the farmers consult with
their neighbors who have sold timber. Sometimes it may pay to
sell the timber locally if the prices are right, as then the
heavy transportation costs are eliminated. Most states have state
foresters who examine woodlands and advise the owner just what to
do. It pays to advertise in the newspapers and secure as many
competitive bids as possible for the timber on the stump.
Generally, unless the prices offered for such timber are
unusually high, the farmer will get greater returns by logging
and sawing the timber and selling it in the form of lumber and
other wood products. The farmer who owns a large forest tract
should have some reliable and experienced timberman carefully
inspect his timber and estimate the amount and value. The owner
should deal with only responsible buyers. He should use a written
agreement in selling timber, particularly where the purchaser is
to do the cutting. The farm woodland owner must always bear in
mind that standing timber can always be held over a period of low
prices without rapid deterioration. In selling lumber, the best
plan is to use the inferior timber at home for building and
repair work and to market the best of the material.
CHAPTER XVII
PUTTING WOOD WASTE TO WORK
For many years technical studies of wood were neglected. Detailed
investigations of steel, concrete, oil, rubber and other
materials were made but wood apparently was forgotten. It has
been only during the last decade since the establishment of the
Forest Products Laboratory of the United States Forest Service,
at Madison, Wisconsin, that tests and experiments to determine
the real value of different woods have been begun. One of the big
problems of the government scientists at that station, which is
conducted in coöperation with the University of Wisconsin, is to
check the needless waste of wood. By actual test they find out
all about the wasteful practices of lumbering in the woods and
mills. Then they try to educate and convert the lumbermen and
manufacturers away from such practices.
The laboratory experts have already performed more than 500,000
tests with 149 different kinds of native woods. As a result of
these experiments, these woods are now being used to better
advantage with less waste in the building and manufacturing
industries. A potential saving of at least 20 per cent. of the
timbers used for building purposes is promised, which means a
salvage of about $40,000,000 annually as a result of strength
tests of southern yellow pine and Douglas fir. Additional tests
have shown that the red heartwood of hickory is just as strong
and serviceable as the white sap wood. Formerly, the custom has
been to throw away the heartwood as useless. This discovery
greatly extends the use of our hickory supply.
Heretofore, the custom has been to season woods by drying them in
the sun. This method of curing not only took a long time but also
was wasteful and expensive. The forestry scientists and lumbermen
have now improved the use of dry kilns and artificial systems of
curing green lumber. Now more than thirty-five of the leading
woods such as Douglas fir, southern yellow pine, spruce, gum and
oak can be seasoned in the kilns in short time. It used to take
about two years of air drying to season fir and spruce. At
present the artificial kiln performs this job in from twenty to
forty days. The kiln-dried lumber is just as strong and useful
for construction as the air-cured stock. Tests have proved that
kiln drying of walnut for use in gun stocks or airplane
propellers, in some cases reduced the waste of material from 60
to 2 per cent. The kiln-dried material was ready for use in
one-third the time it would have taken to season the material in
the air. Heavy green oak timbers for wagons and wheels were dried
in the kiln in ninety to one hundred days. It would have taken
two years to cure this material outdoors.
By their valuable test work, scientists are devising efficient
means of protecting wood against decay. They treat the woods
with such chemicals as creosote, zinc chloride and other
preservatives. The life of the average railroad tie is at least
doubled by such treatment. We could save about one and one-half
billion board feet of valuable hardwood lumber annually if all
the 85,000,000 untreated railroad ties now in use could be
protected in this manner. If all wood exposed to decay were
similarly treated, we could save about six billion board feet of
timber each year.
About one-sixth of all the lumber that is cut in the United
States is used in making crates and packing boxes. The majority
of these boxes are not satisfactory. Either they are not strong
enough or else they are not the right size or shape. During a
recent year, the railroads paid out more than $100,000,000 to
shippers who lost goods in transit due to boxes and crates that
were damaged in shipment.
In order to find out what woods are best to use in crates and
boxes and what sizes and shapes will withstand rough handling,
the Laboratory experts developed a novel drum that tosses the
boxes to and fro and gives them the same kind of rough handling
they get on the railroad. This testing machine has demonstrated
that the proper method of nailing the box is of great importance.
Tests have shown that the weakest wood properly nailed into a
container is more serviceable than the strongest wood poorly
nailed. Better designs of boxes have been worked out which save
lumber and space and produce stronger containers.
Educating the lumbering industry away from extravagant practices
is one of the important activities of the modern forestry
experts. Operators who manufacture handles, spokes, chairs,
furniture, toys and agricultural implements could, by scientific
methods of wood using, produce just as good products by using 10
to 50 per cent. of the tree as they do by using all of it. The
furniture industry not infrequently wastes from 40 to 60 per
cent. of the raw lumber which it buys. Much of this waste could
be saved by cutting the small sizes of material directly from the
log instead of from lumber. It is also essential that sizes of
material used in these industries be standardized.
The Forest Products Laboratory has perfected practical methods of
building up material from small pieces which otherwise would be
thrown away. For example, shoe lasts, hat blocks, bowling pins,
base-ball bats, wagon bolsters and wheel hubs are now made of
short pieces of material which are fastened together with
waterproof glue. If this method of built-up construction can be
made popular in all sections of the country, very great savings
in our annual consumption of wood can be brought about. As
matters now stand, approximately 25 per cent. of the tree in the
forest is lost or wasted in the woods, 40 per cent. at the mills,
5 per cent. in seasoning the lumber and from 5 to 10 per cent. in
working the lumber over into the manufactured articles. This new
method of construction which makes full use of odds and ends and
slabs and edgings offers a profitable way to make use of the 75
per cent. of material which now is wasted.
The vast importance of preserving our forests is emphasized when
one stops to consider the great number of uses to which wood is
put. In addition to being used as a building material, wood is
also manufactured into newspaper and writing paper. Furthermore,
it is a most important product in the making of linoleum,
artificial silk, gunpowder, paints, soaps, inks, celluloid,
varnishes, sausage casings, chloroform and iodoform. Wood
alcohol, which is made by the destructive distillation of wood,
is another important by-product. Acetate of lime, which is used
extensively in chemical plants, and charcoal, are other products
which result from wood distillation. The charcoal makes a good
fuel and is valuable for smelting iron, tin and copper, in the
manufacture of gunpowder, as an insulating material, and as a
clarifier in sugar refineries.
It is predicted that the future fuel for use in automobile
engines will be obtained from wood waste. Ethyl or "grain"
alcohol can now be made from sawdust and other mill refuse. One
ton of dry Douglas fir or southern yellow pine will yield from
twenty to twenty-five gallons of 95 per cent. alcohol. It is
estimated that more than 300,000,000 gallons of alcohol could be
made annually from wood now wasted at the mills. This supply
could be increased by the use of second-growth, inferior trees
and other low-grade material.
CHAPTER XVIII
WOOD FOR THE NATION
Westward the course of forest discovery and depletion has taken
its way in the United States. The pine and hardwood forests of
the Atlantic and New England States first fell before the bite of
the woodman's ax and the sweep of his saw. Wasteful lumbering
finally sapped the resources of these productive timberlands.
Shift was then made farther westward to the Lake States. Their
vast stretches of white pine and native hardwoods were cut to a
skeleton of their original size. The lumbering operations then
spread to the southern pine belt. In a few years the supplies of
marketable lumber in that region were considerably reduced. Then
the westward trail was resumed. The strip of country between the
Mississippi River and the Cascade, Sierra Nevada and Coast Ranges
was combed and cut. Today, the last big drive against our timber
assets is being waged in the forests of the Pacific Coast.
Our virgin forests originally covered 822,000,000 acres. Today,
only one-sixth of them are left. All the forest land now in the
United States including culled, burned and cut-over tracts,
totals 463,000,000 acres. We now have more waste and cut-over
lands in this country than the combined forest area of Germany,
Belgium, Denmark, Holland, France, Switzerland, Spain and
Portugal. The merchantable timber left in the United States
is estimated at 2,215,000,000,000 board feet. The rest is
second-growth trees of poor quality. One-half of this timber is
in California, Washington and Oregon. It is a long and costly
haul from these Pacific Coast forests to the eastern markets.
Less than one-fifth of our remaining timber is hardwood.
56,000,000,000 board feet of material of saw timber size are used
or destroyed in the United States each year. Altogether, we use
more than 26,000,000,000 cubic feet of timber of all classes
annually. Our forests are making annual growth at the rate of
less than one-fourth of this total consumption. We are rapidly
cutting away the last of our virgin forests. We also are cutting
small-sized and thrifty trees much more rapidly than we can
replace them.
[Illustration: A FOREST CROP ON ITS WAY TO THE MARKET]
The United States is short on timber today because our fathers
and forefathers abused our forests. If they had planted trees on
the lands after the virgin timber was removed, we should now be
one of the richest countries in the world in forest resources.
Instead, they left barren stretches and desolate wastes where
dense woods once stood. It is time that the present owners of the
land begin the reclamation of our 326,000,000 acres of cut-over
timberlands. Some of these lands still are yielding fair crops of
timber due to natural restocking and proper care. Most of them
are indifferent producers. One-quarter of all this land is bare
of forest growth. It is our duty as citizens of the United States
to aid as we may in the reforestation of this area.
Fires are cutting down the size of our forests each year. During
a recent five-year period, 160,000 forest fires burned over
56,488,000 acres, an area as large as the state of Utah, and
destroyed or damaged timber and property valued at $85,715,000.
Year by year, fires and bad timber practices have been increasing
our total areas of waste and cut-over land. We are facing a
future lumber famine, not alone because we have used up our
timber, but also because we have failed to make use of our vast
acreage of idle land adapted for growing forests. We must call a
halt and begin all over again. Our new start must be along the
lines of timber planting and tree increase. The landowners, the
States and the Federal Government must all get together in this
big drive for reforestation.
It is impossible to make National Forests out of all the idle
forest land. On the other hand, the matter of reforestation
cannot be left to private owners. Some of them would set out
trees and restore the forests as desired. Others would not. The
public has large interests at stake. It must bear part of the
burden. Proper protection of the forests against fire can come
only through united public action. Everyone must do his part to
reduce the fire danger. The public must also bring about needed
changes in many of our tax methods so that private owners will be
encouraged to go into the business of raising timber. The
Government must do its share, the private landowner must help to
the utmost and the public must aid in every possible way,
including payment of higher prices for lumber as the cost of
growing timber increases.
France and Scandinavia have solved their forest problems along
about the same lines the United States will have to follow. These
countries keep up well-protected public forests. All the
landowners are taught how to set out and raise trees. Everyone
has learned to respect the timberlands. The woods are thought of
as treasures which must be carefully handled. The average man
would no more think of abusing the trees in the forest than he
would of setting fire to his home. The foreign countries are now
busy working out their forestry problems of the years to come. We
in America are letting the future take care of itself.
Our States should aid generally in the work of preventing forest
fires. They should pass laws which will require more careful
handling of private forest lands. They should pass more favorable
timber tax laws so that tree growing will be encouraged. Uncle
Sam should be the director in charge of all this work. He should
instruct the states how to protect their forests against fire. He
should teach them how to renew their depleted woodlands. He
should work for a gradual and regular expansion of the National
Forests. The United States Forest Service should have the power
to help the various states in matters of fire protection, ways of
cutting forests, methods of renewing forests and of deciding
whether idle lands were better adapted for farming or forestry
purposes.
Experts believe that the Government should spend at least
$2,000,000 a year in the purchase of new National Forests. About
one-fifth of all our forests are now publicly owned. One of the
best ways of preventing the concentration of timber in private
ownership is to increase the area of publicly owned forests. Such
actions would prevent the waste of valuable timber and would aid
planting work. For best results, it is thought that the Federal
Government should own about one-half of all the forests in the
country. To protect the watersheds of navigable streams the
Government should buy 1,000,000 acres of woodlands in New England
and 5,000,000 acres in the southern Appalachian Mountains. The
National Forests should also be extended and consolidated.
Federal funds should be increased so that the Forest Service can
undertake on a large scale the replanting of burned-over lands in
the National Forests. As soon as this work is well under way,
Congress should supply about $1,000,000 annually for such work.
Many watersheds in the National Forests are bare of cover due to
forest fires. As a result, the water of these streams is not
sufficient for the needs of irrigation, water power and city
water supply of the surrounding regions.
Right now, even our leading foresters do not know exactly what
the forest resources of the country amount to. It will take
several years to make such a survey even after the necessary
funds are provided. We need to know just how much wood of each
class and type is available. We want to know, in each case, the
present and possible output. We want to find out the timber
requirements of each state and of every important wood-using
industry. Exact figures are needed on the timber stands and their
growth. The experimental work of the Forest Service should be
extended. Practically every forest is different from every other
forest. It is necessary to work out locally the problems of each
timber reservation. Most urgent of all is the demand for a law to
allow Federal officers to render greater assistance to the state
forestry departments in fighting forest fires.
Many state laws designed to perpetuate our forests must be passed
if our remaining timber resources are to be saved. During times
when fires threaten, all the forest lands in each state should
be guarded by organized agencies. This protection should include
cut-over and unimproved land as well as timber tracts. Such a
plan would require that the State and Federal governments bear
about one-half the expenses while the private forest owners
should stand the balance. There would be special rules regulating
the disposal of slashings, methods of cutting timber, and of
extracting forest products such as pulpwood or naval stores.
If our forests are to be saved for the future we must begin
conservation at once. To a small degree, luck plays a part in
maintaining the size of the forest. Some woodlands in the South
Atlantic States are now producing their third cut of saw logs.
Despite forest fires and other destructive agencies, these
forests have continued to produce. Some of the northern
timberlands have grown crops of saw timber and wood pulp for from
one hundred fifty to two hundred fifty years. Expert foresters
report that private owners are each year increasing their
plantings on denuded woodlands. New England landowners are
planting between 12,000,000 and 15,000,000 young forest trees a
year. The Middle Atlantic and Central States are doing about as
well. To save our forests, planting of this sort must be
universal. It takes from fifty to one hundred years to grow a
crop of merchantable timber. What the United States needs is a
national forestry policy which will induce every landowner to
plant and grow more trees on land that is not useful for farm
crops. Our forestry problem is to put to work millions of acres
of idle land. As one eminent forester recently remarked, "If we
are to remain a nation of timber users, we must become a nation
of wood growers."
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