VERMONT AGRICULTURAL REPORT. 63 



supply. The pine of the east has been practically exhausted. 

 Within the past few years the lumber industry of Maine has 

 changed from pine to spruce. The United States uses an- 

 nually the annual growth of one billion acres of well cared 

 for forest land. Our actual resources are less than one-half 

 that number of acres, ill cared for. In view of these facts, 

 would it not be the part of wisdom for Vermonters to handle 

 their timber supply economically, with a thought for tomor- 

 row as well as for today ? At present, thousands of acres of 

 young- spruce and pine are being cut just at the time when 

 they are increasing in quality and quantity most rapidly. 

 Other timber, which is ready for cutting, is being so handled 

 that the land is left practically a waste, instead of being left 

 in conditions to reproduce another crop of valuable timber. 

 To what extent, if any, the state should undertake to regu- 

 late the manner in which private owners handle their timber 

 tracts is too complicated a question to discuss here. The 

 federal government is attempting something in this direc- 

 tion, not of course by force, but in the way of furnishing ad- 

 vice and working plans to owners of timber tracts who wish 

 to handle their property in an economical manner. If this 

 state, for instance, could prevent the cutting, for commerical 

 purposes (unless desirable for thinning or clearing land), of all 

 pine and spruce less than ten inches in diameter, it would 

 confer an enormous benefit on the next generation. It would 

 not only preserve the individual trees, but also would insure 

 the preservation of enough seed trees to reseed the areas cut 

 over to valuable kinds of timber. 



There are many individual farmers in Vermont also who, 

 I think, can afford to take a practical interest in various 

 phases of this subject of forestry. It is probably of little use 

 to urge farmers to plant forests as a crop to any great extent, 

 although there is no doubt that in the end it would prove the 

 most profitable crop that can be raised on many tracts of land. 

 When so few care to plant orchards and wait a dozen years 

 for their reward, still less will plant pines and wait fifty or a 

 hundred years. 



The following points are, I think, worthy of consideration 

 by many farmers of the state who own no extensive timber 

 tracts and who are not interested as lumbermen. 



1. The economical handling of the farm wood lot. Two 

 things are to be chiefly considered ; one is to cut first such 

 timber as has reached its prime, leaving by preference such as 

 is still growing vigorously ; the other is to cut in such a wav 

 that the tract cleared each year will be readily reseeded by 

 trees of desirable sorts left standing. 



2. The planting of waste places on the farm. 



