THE REDWOOD OF CALIFORNIA 



By J. H. Browne 



THE opening of the Panama 

 Canal and the completion of 

 the Northwestern Pacific Rail- 

 road into Humboldt County, 

 California, will mean more to the Red- 

 wood industry than anything since the 

 maniifacture of Redwood began. With 

 the canal, will come the opi^ortunity of 

 marketing Redwood throughout the 

 world in parcel lots of 25, 50 or 100,000 

 feet, where, heretofore, it has been 

 necessary to sell in cargo lots of 1,- 

 000,000 feet or more to obtain advan- 

 tageous freight rates. Direct rail con- 

 nection with the mills in Humboldt 

 County means a saving of from $2.00 

 to $5.00 per M in the cost of making 

 Eastern Redwood shipments. This 

 will assure the mills a better return on 

 such of their product as is now being 

 shipped East, and will enable them to 

 market a large quantity of by-products 

 which are now burnt up or sold at cost 

 locally. 



The market for Redwood was for 

 many years uncertain and limited, its 

 sale depending chiefly upon the Cali- 

 fornia demand. The development of 

 the Eastern and foreign business was 

 slow, because there was no direct rail 

 connection with the Redwood country, 

 it being necessary to bring all shipments 

 into the harbors of San Francisco or 

 Los Angeles for reshipment. 



The earliest logging of Redwood for- 

 ests was by the Spaniards near San 

 Francisco Bay, but their operations 

 were very small. At the beginning of 

 the nineteenth century, a Russian 

 colony near Fort Ross in Mendocino 

 County, cleared a tract of Redwood 

 which has since grown up and again 

 been cut over. It was not until 1850, 

 however, that small sawmills were 

 started at various points along the 

 coast. These have grown until there 

 are now eighteen or twenty more of the 

 important mills in operation with a 

 total annual output of 550,000,000 to 

 600,000,000 feet. 



The biggest stands of Redwood tim- 

 ber are in Del Norte, Himiboldt and 

 Mendocino Counties, but , there are 

 isolated groups as far north as the 

 Chctco River in Curry County, Oregon, 

 and as far south as the Santa Lucia 

 Mountains, Monterey County. The 

 Redwood belt is from twenty to forty 

 miles wide, the trees growing on the 

 west slopes of the coast range. 



The enormous height and diameter of 

 the Redwood is due to the great rainfall 

 in the autumn and winter, from thirty 

 to sixty inches, and to the sea fogs 

 which bathe the coast in the summer. 

 There are two types of the Redwood, 

 those which grow on the slopes and 

 those on the fiats or bottom lands. 

 The Redwood slope is the common 

 type, and it grows mixed with other 

 woods such as Red Fir, Tan Bark Oak 

 and White Fir. As the slopes become 

 moderate, the altitude lower, the soil 

 deeper and the water supply better, 

 the Redwood steadily gains on the other 

 species until on the rich flats there is 

 no other tree. The extreme form of 

 the Redwood flat is along the Eel river, 

 and here the trees attain their greatest 

 known height and clear length. Under 

 best conditions these trees grow to be 

 350 feet high with a diameter of twenty 

 feet. Most of the Redwoods cut are 

 from 400 to 800 years old, and the oldest 

 tree found during the Government 

 investigation in 1900 was 1373 years 

 old. The tree when normal has a 

 straight, slightly tapered bole clear for 

 more than 100 feet, and a crown of 

 horizontal branches that may occupy 

 from one third to one-half of its total 

 length. 



The enemies of Redwood are few and 

 it suffers from them less than other 

 trees. The wind can scarcely uproot it, 

 insects seem to do it little harm, and 

 fungi seldom affects it. Even fire, the 

 great enemy of all trees, though it may 

 occasionally kill whole stands of young 

 Redwood growth, is unable to penetrate 



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