PENAL INSTITUTIONS AND CONSERVATION 



By F. a. GAYLORD 



New York State Forester 



^^^HE subject of reforestation is now altogether too familiar a one to dwell 

 V J on at any great length. It is universally conceived that, in order that 

 our forest lands shall reach a maximum productiveness, they must be arti- 

 ficially reforested, either in whole or in part. The questions boils down to 

 not the need of reforestation, but the practicability of it and practicability 

 means nothing more or less than cost. The first questions always brought 

 up when trying to interest an individual in reforestation, are those concerning 

 cost. Where you can interest one person in reforestation if you could prove 

 a two per cent investment, you could interest ten men if you could prove a 

 four per cent and a hundred men a six per cent investment. 



We all will agree that there are extremely few, if any, individuals or 

 companies who are willing to engage in a business without a profit. There 

 is only one institution under our present mode of living which is in a position 

 to carry on business in this way, that is, the State. Operating costs being 

 the same, the state is in a position to furnish trees at a lower cost than any 

 individual or company. 



There occasionally has been a slight murmur of disapproval at the state 

 engaging in an enterprise of this sort. This disapproval has been so far out- 

 balanced by the opposite sentiment, that it amounts to little, and inasmuch 

 as the state has been the prime mover in the direction of establishing nur- 

 series in many of the eastern states, the disapproval can never be of the 

 importance it would be if the state attempted to invade an already crowded 

 field of industry. Private nurseries will, from the very start, come into ex- 

 istence with the state nurseries an actual fact. 



Skipping the familiar arguments as to the state's right to further refor- 

 estation, let us concede that the state has, and always will have, a right to 

 grow trees for the private individual, and that the state is in a position to best 

 regulate the most important factors as to how the cheapest trees can be 

 produced. It does not take much figuring to determine the cost of planting 

 a thousand acres at $7 per acre and then to figure the compound interest for 

 fifty years. Now do the same at |5 per acre. It can easily be seen that 

 every penny in the reduction of the cost of growing trees is of extreme im- 

 portance in profitable reforestation. So the question arises, where and how 

 can we cut this cost? 



Governor Dix of New York State has gone a great step in advance in 

 answering this question. In the past there has been some talk in using prison 



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