.254 NEBRASKA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY 



the act. Of the thousands of claims secured under the above act ia 

 western iVebraska it is certainly true that relatively few vestiges of 

 the original plantation survive today. 



The tree species used in greatest quantities upon theso claims, if 

 one may judge in part from the present composition of the planta- 

 tion relics, were ash, box elder, cotton wood, black locust, mulberry 

 and hackberry. Occasional scrawny remnants of osage orange, elm, 

 catalpa and maple "claims" indicate thaj; these species were also 

 planted to a certain degree. It appears that in the majority of cases 

 the site was unwisely selected, the trees were poorly planted and then 

 neglected soon after planting. I have seen hundreds of these pitiful 

 vestiges as I have traveled across the sandhills and high plains ia 

 many different localities. The terrible struggle that such trees have 

 endured through the years in the face of drought, fire, hail, fungous 

 and insect pests and hungry beasts has reduced them to uncanny 

 forms. Here they are dwarf ted, deformed, diseased, victims of man's 

 unconcern and abandonment and remnants of a pathetic strug,i,le for 

 existence. I have wondered why some writer with a love for the plains 

 has not been inspired by these pygmies to write an additional chapter 

 in the history of the timber claim generations. 



But I would not have my readers believe that this picture of 

 desolation is the only result of the various attempts to make the plain 

 more inhabitable by planting trees. Numerous such projects have 

 been crowned with signal success. Stately groves sometimes occur 

 as close neighbors of desolate, abandoned tree claims. Many well 

 established groves that have received some slight managerial attention 

 have attained in thirty or forty years dimensions that should be at 

 least encouraging. The attention that such plantations have received 

 may all be included in protection from fire and grazing animals. 

 Such stands of timber should be valuable lessons before the home- 

 steader and the ranchman who really desires to secure some of the 

 varied returns from a successful plantation of trees. I could take you 

 to groves of ash and cottonwood trees in western Nebraska which 

 would do credit to any country, climate or soil. Groves which not 

 only afford excellent protection from the furies of the wind, but which 

 in addition yield desirable quantities of posts, poles and possibly, in 

 time, cheaper grades of lumber also. From studies that are now in 

 progress with reference to prolonging the life of softer woods when 

 in contact with the soil it does not seem too optimistic to predict that 

 ranchmen and homesteaders in certain parts of the state may soon be 

 able to produce quantities of post and pole material sufficient to meet 

 all of their demands for such products; products which become more 

 and more necessary as the population of remote areas increase. 



So firmly has the federal government believed in the possibility 

 of covering areas of semi-arid Nebraska with stands of trees that they 

 are spending thousands of dollars each year upon experiments pointed 

 toward, the discovery of species and methods which will yield profitable 



