i86 AMERICAN FORESTRY 



The Lesson of Canada in the province. This policy has brought 



A^ r.^j^ . , . ^ , into Canada from Michigan many mills 

 1 ONE of the sessions of the that formerly manufactured Ontario 

 Canadian Forestry Association held timber in that state. Ouebec proposes 

 last week at Fredencton, New Bruns- to adopt a similar policy, and Mr 

 wick, the chairman of the Canadian sifton urged it upon the consideration 

 Conservation Commission, Hon. Clif- of New Brunswick. He did not be- 

 iord Sifton, made an address of much ijeye it to be wise for the government to 

 interest to us on this side of the line, dispose of the fee in its timber lands. 

 We are accustomed to thmk of Canada when so disposed of they became sub- 

 as a country of big woods and mex- ject to taxation by the state, which to 

 haustib e timber supply, ookmg at it in obtain as large a revenue as possible 

 much the same careless fashion that we fi^ed a high rate which encouraged 

 have been wont to regard our own con- lumbermen to cut the timber as rapidly 

 ditions until we were aroused, most of ^g possible. The Dominion policv is to 

 us, to tlie actual situation. Not long lease land on renewal terms and to 

 ago a German forest expert^ was sent continue the leases as long as the lessees 

 to Canada to report on conditions there, y,^^ ^p to the terms of the leases, 

 and his report was to the effect that Mr. Sifton urged the association to 

 other countries could not look to Can- f^vor the establishment of forest re- 

 ada for their timber supply, that our serves on the eastern slopes of the 

 northern neighbor needed all of her Rocky Mountains, because unless some- 

 own product for her own uses, and was thing were done to preserve the forests 

 coming to realize it. This German re- there the country would be flooded 

 port was cited at length by the British ^t one season of the year and become 

 Royal Commission on Afforestation, in ^ barren waste at another. Evidently. 

 Its able and instructive report recom- the distinguished Canadian had not 

 mending the reforestation of 9,000,000 heard from the United States Weather 

 acres of land in England, and Bureau 



providing a detailed plan for financing jhe moral of all this is that, like all 



and carrying out this work through a ^he rest of the civilized world, Canada 



series of years, m order that England -^ measuring her timber resources and 

 might produce its own timber and be- „_ ^-4. ,. 4. 4.1 u 



^ ', J ^ r r • .. - preparing to protect them by pro- 



come independent of foreign countries. • j 1 ..• . 



In the address referred tS, Mr. Sifton ^'"ef \f .^"^ /^^fj^ measures against 

 called attention to the fact that the f P^^/tation for the benefi of waste- 

 United States cannot supply itself with ^^^ /f ^^^^ countries mcluding her 

 wood for more than thirty years, and "^xt-door neighbor. We cannot look 

 declared that ''should it become neces- ^° ^^^ "f^*^ ^^^ O"'" salvation. We must 

 sary for the United States to look to husband all our remaming resources 

 Canada for a further supply of wood, ^"^ P^^"* trees wherever they can be 

 all the merchantable lumber in Canada's ^o^n more profitably than other crops, 

 forests would be exhausted at the end i" order that our own future may be 

 of seven years.'" We quote from the assured. That is the only way. Canada 

 press report. Mr. Sifton expressed the has not the resources for her own 

 opinion that within the present genera- needs and ours too, and she is suffi- 

 tion it would be necessary to place legal ciently wide awake and intelligent to 

 limitations upon the quantity of lumber guard her own. The only way that our 

 to be cut. and he believed in making a timber resources and Canada's can be 

 beginning of that policy at once. On- made inexhaustible is by the applica- 

 tario already compels all timber cut on don of the highest scientific knowledge 

 government lands to be manufactured and the broadest common sense. 



