36 TRANSACTIONS OF THE ILLINOIS 



" Strawberries were quite generally killed. The Wilson is our principal berry, 

 but the past season this afforded veiy little fruit. 



" Of Peach trees not one was left to narrate the stoiy of their death. 



"Evergreens, of the hardier varieties, showed very little injury. Occasionally a 

 few of the terminal buds appeared injured on the Norway Spruce, but most of them 

 grew. White, Scotch, and Austrian Pine, Siberian Arbor Vitae and Balsam Fir showed 

 no signs of injuiy. 



"American Arbor VitK and Irish and Swedish Junipers were slightly scalded ; Chi- 

 nese Arbor Vita; must be protected ; the Junipers need slight protection when young. 



" The year now closing might afford themes for volumes, but we have not time now 

 to discuss them. 



" We cannot control the elements, but can do much to allay their severity, if the 

 minds of the people can be properly educated. We need protection in growing fruit. 

 We demand forest planting for the amelioration of our climate, and even for perpetua- 

 tion of a free and happy people. Will we be recreant to our own interests and to the 

 trusts imposed ujDon us by remaining inactive in regard to this work, and pennit pos- 

 terity to point to our selfishness as the cause of the decline of this great Republic ? 

 Herein is the impending danger. Let us take such action as to avert it, that genera- 

 tions hence may not point to its decline and downfall as we now do to that of many 

 portions of the Old World.'" 



ORNAMENTAL AND TIMBER TREES. 



W. C. Flagg, from the Standing Committee on Ornamental and 

 Timber Trees, read as follows : 



CONDITIONS OF TREE GROWTH. 



In a report presented to the Society last year, I gave a statement 

 derived from the census of 1870, showing that our State had 14. i per 

 cent, of its surface in some kind of tree growth — that Northern Illinois 

 had only 7.5 per cent, of woodland, whilst Central Illinois had 10.8 per 

 cent., and Southern Illinois, 23.7 per cent. 



Assuming the woodland in farms to be all, more than two-thirds of 

 our State contained but a small ratio of timber, although we border upon 

 the wooded region of Indiana, which, but for settlement and cultivation, 

 would stretch out an unbroken forest to the Atlantic, and although the 

 more southerly State of Missouri on our west had an average woodland 

 area of 21 per cent., and our southern region of our own State, as I have 

 shown, 23.7 per cent. In other words. Central and Northern Illinois 

 are just out of, and on the verge of successful natural timber growth, such 

 as is seen in the magnificent forests of Indiana and Michigan, and of our 

 lower Egypt. They are subject to unfavorable conditions, apparently, 

 which increase as one goes westward. Iowa had but about 7 per cent, of 

 forests, and Colorado still less. These conditions must be known and 

 appreciated by all who would plant trees ; and I propose to devote this 

 report to a consideration of the facts affecting tree growth in Illinois. 



A tree exists in the earth and in the air. It has certain root functions 

 that must be performed beneath the surface of the earth, and will be per- 

 formed well or ill, according as the soil and subsoil are congenial ; and 



