REFORESTING CUT-OVER PINELANDS 



IN replying to an inquiry from S. 

 G. Stoney, president of the Agri- 

 cultural Society of South Caro- 

 lina, regarding the reforestation of cut- 

 over pine lands in that State, Assistant 

 Forester W. R. Greeley of the Forest 

 Service has expressed the following 

 opinion : 



"Generally speaking, after the mer- 

 chantable timber has been removed 

 from lands within the coastal pine belt 

 of South Carolina and adjacent States, 

 the only practicable measure to secure 

 their reforestation is to protect the cut- 

 over areas from fire. Under ordinary 

 conditions such lands will restock them- 

 selves with a growth of pine if fires 

 can be kept out. More than this is 

 ordinarily not practicable for the owner. 



"Good forestry should begin before 

 such areas are cut. From investiga- 

 tions made by the Forest Service on a 

 number of tracts in the southern piner- 

 ies it appears practicable to adopt more 

 conservative methods of cutting than 

 are commonly practiced. The aim of 

 this should be to restrict the trees re- 

 moved to those which are mature, leav- 

 ing on the ground the younger, thriftier 

 trees which are still making a fair rate 

 of growth. Ordinarily this would mean 

 probably the leaving of a quarter or a 

 third of the merchantable stand per 

 acre which is usually removed. The 

 trees so left would of course be those 

 of the smaller size and particularly of 

 shorter clear length and containing the 

 most limbs and knots. Obviously they 

 are the trees which yield inferior grades 

 of lumber. By leaving such trees stand- 

 ing and restricting the cut to the older 

 growth which contains the best quality 

 of lumber, it is my judgment that oper- 

 ators would often find the results bene- 

 ficial from a business and manufactur- 

 ing standpoint. The trees so left would 

 insure a thorough restocking of the 

 ground which, together with the ex- 

 clusion of fires, would result in com- 

 plete restocking of the land. 



674 



"If you have any considerable acre- 

 age still uncut I suggest that you con- 

 sider the practicability of adopting 

 measures of this character. Unfortu- 

 nately the Forest Service is no longer 

 able, on account of the demands of its 

 other work, to make examinations of 

 extensive private holdings and give the 

 owners specific advice on their manage- 

 ment. I enclose, however, a list of con- 

 sulting foresters who are prepared to 

 do just such work and to give the owner 

 or operator specific recommendations 

 on how his land should be managed 

 with reference both to practical lum- 

 bering operations and insuring a second 

 growth of timber. 



"For the lands which you have 

 previously cut over, however, I have 

 just one suggestion, namely, that fires 

 be rigidly excluded. The custom prev- 

 alent in many parts of the South of 

 burning over pine lands annually to se- 

 cure a heavier growth of forage is us- 

 ually fatal to any forest reproduction. 

 Such fires do not kill the larger trees 

 and often may not seriously injure 

 saplings 15 inches in diameter or up- 

 wards. They inevitably, however, pre- 

 vent the starting of seedlings and hence 

 keep the land from producing nearly as 

 dense a growth of timber as it naturally 

 would if fires can be eliminated. 



"Aside frorn protection from fire, the 

 only possible step would be reforesta- 

 tion by artificial methods. This is prac- 

 ticable as a matter of investment in cer- 

 tain localities, but not everywhere. The 

 Forest Service hesitates to recommend 

 it as a general practice because the mar- 

 ket values of timber are not yet in the 

 main sufficiently high to meet the cost 

 of planting and caring for the young 

 trees until they reach merchantable 

 size. Our investigations have shown 

 that in the case of loblolly pine, which 

 makes exceptionally rapid growth, a 

 good merchantable crop paying reason- 

 ably fair returns upon the investment 

 may be secured in 40 years. With long- 



