NEWS AND NOTES 



51; 



H. R., 147, is designed to create a system 

 of fire wardens, these to suppress and pre- 

 vent forest fires on woodlots and wild lands ; 

 $50,000 appropriated. 



H. R., 159, provides that, within certain 

 limitations, all forest reserves shall be sub- 

 ject to an annual charge of 2 cents per acre 

 for school purposes. 



H. R., 175, is designed to protect trees 

 growing by roadsides and within road limits, 

 and provides penalties for injuring or de- 

 stroying trees. 



H. R., 253, permits the acquisition of for- 

 est or other suitable lands by municipalities 

 for the purpose of establishing municipal 

 forests. 



H. R., 542, appropriates $374,500 for the 

 department of forestry. 



H. R., 553, appropriates $20,000 for salaries 

 of instructors, stationery, maintenance, etc., 

 and $1,000 to equip laboratory. 



H. R., 557, sets aside $100,000 for the pur- 

 chase of lands for forest reserves, and 

 $100,000 for a similar purpose for the fiscal 

 year beginning June i, 1909. and an equal 

 amount for the fiscal year following. 

 The following measures were defeated: 

 H. R., 226, to regulate the management 

 of timberlands in Pennsylvania for the pur- 

 pose of preventing floods and droughts, con- 

 serving water supply, and securing favorable 

 conditions of water-flow. 



H. R., 228, for purchase and distribution of 

 tree seeds. 



H. R., 244, to protect privately-owned 

 woodlands from fire, theft, and other damage. 

 H. R., 257, providing for the protection of 

 the state forest reserves. 



H. R., 286, transferring to the department 

 of forestry the control and management of 

 all public highways not improved state high- 

 ways bordering on or lying within state for- 

 est reserves. 



H. R., 383, designed to establish auxiliary 

 forest reserves, and punish violations. 



H. R., 386, to provide for taxation of 

 auxiliary forest reserves. 



H. R., 469, to increase privileges of for- 

 estry reservation commission in leasing rights 

 of way, lands for water-power plants, em- 

 ploying forest rangers, etc. 



H. K., 813, appropriating $3,500 for the 

 purchase of herbarium and library belonging 

 to Dr. Joseph T. Rothrock. 



H. R., 826, appropriating $15,000 to estab- 

 lish recreation camps in forest reserves. 



^ )^ ^ 



Progress in New Hampshire 



Mr. Philip W. Ayres, forester for the So- 

 ciety for the Protection of New Hampshire 

 Forests, writes : 



"We have just passed a new law which 

 brings us into the line of the progressive 

 states in having a state forester who works 

 in connection with the state forestry com- 

 mission of three unpaid members. We have 

 revised our forest-fire laws so that they are 

 excellent, as nearly complete as those in the 



other progressive states. Our new state for- 

 estry commission is made up as follows : 

 Robert P. Bass, Peterborough, president; 

 J. H. Tolles, Nashua, treasurer; W. Robin- 

 son Brown, Berlin, secretary. The commis- 

 sion has appointed a new state forester, E. G. 

 Hirst, a graduate of the Yale Forest School. 

 He previously completed his course at the 

 Ohio State University. 



"You will be interested that the plans for 

 the Conference at Bretton Woods are making 

 good progress." 



^ ^ ^ 



What a State Might Do 



The latest statistics in the report of the 

 New Hampshire Forestry Commission state 

 that over 800,000 acres of land, once cleared, 

 have since 1880 been abandoned to grow up 

 in brush, says Collier's. If New Hampshire 

 had been the municipaHty of Zurich, Switz- 

 erland, this would have been taken under some 

 formof thedoctrine of eminent domain, planted 

 with trees, and in the later generation have 

 become an asset for its people. The people 

 of Zurich once found themselves without 

 the timber needed for its maintenance, for 

 the building of its homes, and took this 

 wise step. To-day, when the expense of 

 operation is paid, the property yields to the 

 government of the city something over $15 

 an acre. 



What would be the opinion of the genera- 

 tion of New Hampshire citizens thirty years 

 from now of the work of their forebears 

 if they should find themselves possessed of 

 several hundred thousand acres of white 

 pine, planted and managed by a competent 

 state forester, properly accountable to the 

 people, in place of nearly 1,000,000 acres 

 now shorn of forest and abandoned by the 



plow? 



It is within the constitutional power of 

 the leg-slative branch of the state govern- 

 ment of New Hampshire to seize this land, 

 plant it with trees— with white pine for 

 the advancing generation, and with spruce 

 for the remoter descendants. 



An issue of bonds, to pay the expenditure 

 necessary for the condemnation, reforesta- 

 tion and guardianship of the growing for- 

 ests, and redeemable at stated intervals by 

 the sale of the lands back to to the people, 

 under definite restrictions to insure the 

 preservation of the forests, would probably 

 reimburse the state for its work. It could 

 then be provided that only a certain portion 

 of the growth should be cut in any year, 

 that the trees of small girth should be 

 spared, and that all the danger of fire caused 

 by allowing the waste to remain within the 

 forest should be prevented by compelling 

 the timber harvesters to remove and burn it. 



Doctor Hale, during the recent winter, in 

 one of his addresses, oflfered the suggestion 

 that towns become the owners of forests 

 just bevond the village limits, as has been 

 done in Zurich. This would act as a sup- 

 plementary reforestation to that of the 

 state— which would obviously apply only to 



