A NEW SOAP MATERIAL 



SETTLERS in western Kansas 

 are cutting and marketing soap 

 weed, or Spanish bayonet, to 

 supply the demands of soap 

 manufacturers, according to a report 

 recently received from officers of the 

 Kansas national forest. There are vari- 

 ous plants in the southwest locally 

 known- as soap weed, called amole by 

 the Mexicans, but the one gathered 

 by the Kansas farmers, technically 

 known as Yucca bacata, a species with 

 exceptionally large fruits, is the most 

 used. The soap maniifacturers, how- 

 ever, utilize the tops or the roots. 

 Manufacturers are paying $8 a ton for 

 the plant at the railway stations, while 

 the estimated cost of cutting, drying, 

 baling, and hauling ranges from $5 to 

 $6, depending upon the distance to the 

 railroad. Since a man can ordinarily 

 get out a ton a day, the gathering of 

 the soap weed affords an opportunity 

 to secure a fair day's wages at a time 

 when other ranch activities are not 

 pressing. After cutting, the soap weed 

 is allowed to dry from 60 to 90 days and 

 then is baled up in the ordinary broom- 

 corn baling machine. 



For a long time this weed has been 

 made into a soapy decoction which the 

 Indian and Mexican women have used, 

 particularly for washing their hair, for 



which purpose it is considered especially 

 suited, since it contains no alkali. 

 Present day soap manufacturers use 

 it for toilet and wool soaps. Its 

 qualities have been known for a long 

 time but the harvesting of soap weed 

 is just now becoming commercially 

 important. 



The industry is now operating on 

 lands adjacent to the Kansas national 

 forest and it is expected that the de- 

 mand will soon spread to that forest, 

 some portions of which bear an abund- 

 ant supply of the plant. There is a 

 plentiful supply of it throughout south- 

 ern Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico, 

 and Texas. 



Forest officers have considered this 

 weed a nuisance since it is the nature 

 of the plant to spread over entensive 

 areas and kill off other vegetation. It is 

 particularly a pest on stock ranges. In 

 line with its policy of range improve- 

 ment, the Government is anxious to rid 

 the forage areas of all such injurious 

 plants, and it is the hope of the forest 

 officers that the commercial demand for 

 soap weed will soon reach such propor- 

 tions that it will not only take an other- 

 wise useless product, but also will 

 eradicate it from areas which could be 

 utilized to better advantage for the 

 supplying of forage to cattle and sheep. 



WHITE PINE GROWING PROFITABLE 



THE growing of white pine, says 

 the Department of Agriculture 

 in a bulletin recently issued on 

 the subject, is a profitable 

 undertaking at 6 per cent compoimd 

 interest. To bring in these returns, the 

 trees may be cut when not more than 

 from 35 to 70 years old. 



The original white pine forests are ap- 

 proaching exhaustion, according to the 

 department, and with the growing 

 scarcity of large-sized, high-grade white 

 pine lumber, lower grades now find a 

 ready market. Besides this, the tree 



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grows rapidly, has a heavy yield, and is 

 easy to manage. 



Second growth white pine, 50 years 

 old, on good soil, may yield as much as 

 49,000 feet of lumber per acre. On 

 medium soil, stands of the same age 

 36,000 board feet, and even on poor 

 soil, 24,000 feet. White pine boxboard 

 lumber, one of the chief products of 

 such stands, sells for from $12 to $18 

 a thousand board feet. Material for 

 making matches, another product, sells 

 for from $17 to $18 a thousand. Even 

 larger material, suitable for sashes and 



