BKAL OX 'J IMHER. 107 



^yost of Greenville, wliere ^rontonlni and Kent counties in ^Michigan 

 join, I visited a beantifiil and wry exceptional lalce, Tialdwin lake, sur- 

 ronn(^ed by iirowinii!,- limber in considevalde variety. Larjje pine f^tumps 

 showed what had been taken off dnrinsi; a few years past. There were 

 still reniainino; some large living pine trees that were cnlls. The young 

 pines were thick enongh and were of all sizes up to a diameter of fifteen 

 to eighteen inches, some of which had recently been harvested. An early 

 settler who had been familiar with the region for over forty years tells 

 me that fire has never desolated the region, neither have cattle been 

 permitted to feed over the land bronsing the young trees. It is a veri- 

 table oasis of yonng timber, growing on the hills jnst where timber shonld 

 continue to grow, and where ordinary farm crojjs would prove unprofit- 

 able owing to the deep washouts, and the difficulty of cultivating such 

 land and the trouble of harvesting the crops, besides the soil is not very 

 productive of corn, wheat or potatoes. 



so:me of the changes now taking place in a forest 



of oak openings. 



W. J. REAL. 



Just across the road north of the Agricultural College is a piece of 

 virgin forest about twenty acres in extent. It appears to have been 

 what was called oak openings fifty to seventy years ago. I have often 

 visited this forest during the past thirty-one years. 



The oldest trees now living are chiefly white oak and they are remote 

 from each other, say not over one to twenty square rods, with a few of 

 smaller size. The larger white oaks are two to three and one-half feet 

 in diameter. 



Black oaks are quite abundant, but are much younger and smaller, 

 not many of which are more than a foot in diameter. On the lower land 

 there is occasionally a red oak. Red maples are found all through the 

 forest, a few of which are eighteen inches to two feet in diameter. There 

 are five large sugar maples, if I found them all. Extending north and 

 south by this piece of woods is a highway and cleared fields at the west. 



On the east side of the road next to the woods stands a lone, tall old 

 sugar maple thirty inches in diameter. For some reason it now looks as 

 though this single old tree was in the act of converting a considerable 

 block of the oak forest into a maple forest, for there are large numbers 

 of young sugar maples of various sizes in the area where the seeds have 

 fallen from this interesting mother tree. One maple in this area is but 

 eight inches in diameter, a very few are five inches, but they do not seem 

 to be fruiting. Large numbers are one and two inches through, while 

 those six inches to a foot or even six to eight feet high exist in vast 

 numbers. As might be expected the small maples are thickest where 

 there is least shade above. 



Why are fair sized red maples so much thicker here than sugar 

 maples? Apparently because the red maple stumps or roots below 

 ground, when so left by a fire, will sprout with greater certainty sending 



