884 



AMERICAN FORESTRY 



lungs and a constitution able to stand exposure to all kinds of 

 wind and weather. Heart disease, tuberculosis and other 

 serious organic troubles are handicaps that point to the choice 

 of another occupation. 



"On the other hand, there are certain disabilities, and par- 

 ticularly injuries of various sorts, that do not constitute any 

 serious drawback. Injuries to the mouth, nose, ears, scalp 

 and other parts of the head, for example, do not disqualify 

 unless they interfere to a dangerous extent with one's eyesight 

 or hearing. Some deafness is allowable provided it has not 

 gone so far as to prevent communication or to endanger one 

 from falling trees or other accidents. Even blindness in one 

 eye is not a real handicap if the other eye is still sound. The 

 loss of an arm or a leg incapacitates a man for the physical 

 work required of most foresters, but minor injuries to these 

 limbs, such as loss of a finger or a toe, do not disqualify one. 



"For certain specialized duties one can have sustained even 

 more serious injuries and still be able to give satisfactory serv- 

 ice. One may be badly crippled and yet be successful in research 

 work, provided he is able to move about more or less freely, 

 has some use of his arms, and can handle a microscope. Men 

 at fire-lookout stations need little more than good eyes and 

 sufficient hearing to use a telephone. On the other hand, one 

 would hardly wish to take up fire-lookout work as a perma- 

 nent occupation, and unless his condition can be improved 

 sufficiently to enable him to resume active physical work his 

 chances for advancement are poor. Special appliances for hand- 

 ling tools are not necessary, as is the case with many industrial 

 workers. The average forester must be able to turn his hand 

 to a wide variety of activities and to use such homely imple- 

 ments as the ax, the hammer, the shovel and the mattock. 



"The danger of further injury is no greater in forestry than 

 in most other outdoor occupations. Accidents due to forest 

 fires, bucking horses, falling trees and rolling stones are always 

 possible, but the proportion of those seriously injured in such 

 ways as these is not large. Those employed by the National 

 Government receive compensation in case of injury incurred 

 in line of duty. 



What Training Is Necessary. 



"Forestry requires the services of three more or less distinct 

 grades of workers — the professional forester, the forest ranger, 

 and the forest guard. The professional forester handles the 

 larger and more technical phases of forest management. He 

 determines what the forest under his charge contains, how 

 much it is worth, how fast it is growing, when and how it should 

 be cut, what kinds of trees should be favored, and other ques- 

 tions of the same kind; and also exercises general supervi- 

 sion over the execution of whatever measures are decided 

 upon. The forest ranger acts as a sort of semi-technical assist- 

 ant to the professional forester. He does not need so thorough 

 an education as the professional forester but must have suffi- 

 cient technical knowledge to enable him to carry out intelli- 

 gently the plans formulated by the latter. His work is to a 

 large extent 'practical' and involves the routine of fire protec- 

 tion and fire fighting, marking the trees to be removed in timber 

 sales, scaling the felled logs, handling planting operations, sur- 

 veying, building trails, running telephone lines, and doing other 

 work connected with the administration of the forest. The 

 forest guard is ordinarily a non-technical assistant who helps 

 the forest ranger in those aspects of his work which require 

 little or no knowledge of forestry. Forest guards are fre- 

 quently appointed for short periods only to help the regular 

 force during the busy season, and particularly in the work of 

 fire protection and fire fighting. Previous experience in the 

 woods or in similar occupations such as lumbering and survey- 

 ing constitutes a valuable, but not essential, preliminary train- 

 ing for foresters of all grades. 



"Twenty-five years ago the professional forester was almost 

 unknown in this country and there was not a single educa- 

 tional institution at which he could secure the necessary train- 

 ing. Today the profession is well recognized and there are 

 more than 20 schools offering instruction of a grade similar 

 to that required of civil engineers, doctors, lawyers, ministers 

 and other professional men. As a basis for the more techni- 

 cal phases of his education the man who desires to become a 

 professional forester must have had courses of collegiate grade 

 in botany, geology, organic chemistry, mathematics through 

 trigonometry, plane surveying, mechanical drawing, economics, 

 and either French or German, or preferably both. With these 

 as a foundation he is ready to go ahead with the technical sub- 

 jects such as dendrology, silvics, silviculture, forest mensura- 

 tion, forest valuation, forest management and forest regula- 

 tion. Obviously a comprehensive training of this sort cannot 

 be obtained with less than four years of collegiate work, at 

 least two of which must be devoted almost entirely to profes- 

 sional forestry subjects. If a man has already had a college edu- 

 cation, however, he can readily prepare himself for the profession 

 by two years of post-graduate work. The degree of bachelor of 



science in forestry is usually given on the completion of a 

 four-year professional course, and of master of science in for- 

 estry, or master of forestry, on the completion of a five-year 

 professional course or of two years of post-graduate work fol- 

 lowing four years of regular college work. 



"For the forest ranger no such intensive training is neces- 

 «ary. With a high school education as a background, one year 

 of rather elementary training in such subjects as fire protec- 

 tion, surveying, timber estimating and scaling, nursery practice, 

 methods of planting, range management and report writing is 

 lufiicient to enable a man to qualify. 



"In general, the course covers much the same ground as that 

 taken by the professional forester, but in a much briefer and 

 more elementary way. Those who have already had consider- 

 able practical exi)erience along these lines can secure a suffi- 

 cient foundation for their work in three or four months, al- 

 though even for such men the longer course is preferable if 

 time to take it can be found. Many of the forest schools of the 

 country now offer courses of this sort and the opportunities for 

 instruction are ample. 



"Since forest guards are engaged almost wholly on non- 

 technical work no particular course of training is necessary. 

 No one with any ambition, however, would wish to remain a 

 forest guard indefinitely when other opportunities are open to 

 him merely by taking a free course of instruction. If one 

 wishes to take up forestry, therefore, and is not in a position 

 to take the professional course, he should by all means attempt 

 to qualify as a forest ranger. Should lack of other openings 

 then make it necessary for him to serve as a forest guard for 

 the time being, he would be in a position to take advantage of 

 the first opportunity for advancement. 



What opportunities Are Offered. 



"Opportunities for employment for foresters may be classed 

 as fairly good. The point has now been passed where the 

 supply is totally inadequate to meet the demand, but at the same 

 time the war has greatly depleted the ranks of foresters through- 

 out the country, and there is no question that many new men 

 will be needed during the process of reconstruction and after- 

 wards. The National Forests already offer opportunities for 

 the employment of many men and it cannot be doubted that 

 similar opportunities will soon be offered in State forests as 

 well as in the case of forests still in the hands of private 

 owners. With the steady decrease in the timber supply, the 

 Nation will soon be face to face with the necessity of practicing 

 forestry extensively as a national safeguard and unless private 

 owners take upon themselves the task, there is little question but 

 that the Federal and State Governments will take matters 

 largely into their own hands. 



"Altogether it is a safe prediction that any one who desires to 

 engage in forestry and who qualifies himself for the work will 

 be able to find employment. The entering salary for forest 

 guards in the national service averages about $900 a year and 

 for forest rangers about $1,100 a year. Technically trained for- 

 esters ordinarily enter at approximately the same salary as 

 forest rangers, $1,100 or $1,200 a year, but with greater oppor- 

 tunities for advancement later. In State and private work ap- 

 proximately the same entering salaries may be expected although 

 some private owners may be unwilling to pay quite so much to 

 forest guards and forest rangers at the start. 



What Are The Chances For Promotion. 



"Chances for limited promotion are reasonably good. It 

 should be recognized frankly, however, that one can not hope 

 to get rich in the profession and that a comfortable living is 

 all that can ordinarily be looked forward to. In exceptional 

 cases unusually able and well qualified men will doubtless be 

 able to draw salaries of $4,000 and $5,000 a year. The average 

 professional forester, however, can hardly hope to advance much 

 beyond $2,500 or $3,500 a year except by acquiring an interest 

 in some lumber business or in the forest itself. For the forest 

 ranger a salary of $1,500 or $1,600 may reasonably be looked 

 forward to. Moreover, this salary often carries with it a ranger 

 station which can be occupied as long as he stays in the service, 

 and also an opportunity to produce some crops for his own 

 use. Forest guards can hardly hope for more than $900 or $1,000 

 a year. 



"In other words, in forestry, as in all other professions, the 

 better educated you are the better are your chances for promo- 

 tion. Even at best, however, the chances for large salaries are 

 small and those who are bent on getting rich should look else- 

 where for an opportunity to do so. On the other hand, one who 

 is satisfied to make a comfortable living, to spend a large part 

 of his life in the open, to occupy a responsible and respected 

 place in his home community, and to enjoy the satisfaction 

 whicli comes from having an important share in a work of great 

 public service, cannot look for a more congenial or attractive 

 occupation than forestry." 



