252 ANNUAL REPORTS OF DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



estry. Immediately the need is to develop western sources of supply. 

 This was made clear in a report on a bill introduced by Senator Poin- 

 dtvxter authoriziuir the Secretary of Agriculture to make a survey of 

 pulpwoods on the public domain and to prepare a plan for the 

 reforestation of pulpwood lands. The report brouglit out that the 

 use of newsprint paper has been increasin<^ much more rapidly than 

 the population while the supply of raw material in the regions where 

 its manufacture is centered has been steadily decreasing. Approxi- 

 mately 95 per cent of the newsprint manufacturing industry is in 

 New England, New York, and the Lake States. Large areas in these 

 regions, once covered with pulp timber, have been cut over or burned 

 over and are now producing but little, and the annual cut is several 

 times greater than the growth of the forests. The industry has made 

 but a meager development in the Pacific Northwest and none in 

 Alaska, where our largest remaining timber supplies suitable for 

 newsprint are located. Canadian supplies are no more inexhaustible 

 than our own, and in the eastern provinces the industry is still ex- 

 panding very rapidly. The United States can not permanently rely 

 on obtaining increased supplies of pulpwood and newsprint from 

 Canada, even if that should be regarded as desirable as a matter of 

 public iDolicy. An exhaustive survey of our pulpwood resources, as 

 proposed by the Poindexter bill, is necessary and urgent. 



Greatly increased attention was paid to keeping in touch with the 

 situation and developments in the lumber industry. Current studies 

 were made of market conditions, lumber production, stocks on hand, 

 shipments, and price tendencies, as well as of labor and operating 

 conditions, exports and imports, and transportation. The collection 

 of lumber prices was conducted on a more systematic and comprehen- 

 sive basis than before. In the case of southern yellow pine, current 

 prices based on actual sales are now being obtained on an approxi- 

 mate annual cut of 10,000,000,000 board feet. 



Statistical work connected with the production of forest products 

 was continued. Figures covering the production of lumber, lath, 

 and shingles, tight and slack cooperage, and wood pulp, and the con- 

 sumption of pulpwood for the calendar year 191S were secured and 

 published. These statistics are the only authoritative ones of the 

 kind collected and are widely used not only by the lumber and other 

 wood-using industries, but by various Government organizations and 

 the business world in general. 



RANGE INVESTIGATIONS. 



During the field seasons of 1917 and 1918, as a war measure, all 

 available range experts were placed on a rough survey with a view 

 to immediate!}^ increasing the stock carried on the National Forest 

 ranges as far as possible. Beginning wath the field season of 1919. 

 intensive range reconnaissance to determine permanent carrying capa- 

 cities was again undertaken; 1.935,830 acres were covered by special 

 crews and 180,338 by local forest officers, bringing the total area of 

 National Forest range thus covered to date up to 18,524,508 acres. 



The experiments in the artificial reseeding of range with cultivated 

 forage plants were continued in a limited way at the Great Basin 

 Experiment Station and Jornada Range Reserve. They confirm the 

 view that this method will be useful on a small, but iniportant, per- 

 centage of the range where growth conditions are exceptionally favor- 



