70 



ARBORICULTURE 



constructing the first railways throiig-h 

 Southern Ilhnois. Because of this appre- 

 ciation the natural forests disappeared 

 very rapidly, and but comparatively few 

 specimens of this natural forest growth 

 may now be found. There are still 

 enough, however, to repay any one inter- 

 ested in the subject to visit tlie groves 

 still in existence in Southern Illinois. 



THE FARI^INGTON PLANTATION. 



The writer here quotes from a Govern- 

 ment report, and gives numerous tables, 

 estimates of values, etc. Continuing the 

 subject, he says : 



The average value per acre is seen from 

 the table to be $390.21. This would give 

 for the whole plantation of 400 acres a 

 value of $156,084. 



It is very interesting to give in this con- 

 nection an estimate made on an entirely 

 different basis. In the winter of 1900 the 

 owners of the Farlington forest let a con- 

 tract for the cutting of 125,000 posts. 

 The specifications called for straight 

 posts, 6j^ feet long, measuring 4 inches 

 in diameter at the top. These were sold 

 at 10 cents each, or altogether $12,500. It 

 was estimated that this cut removed one- 

 tenth of the trees. Had all the timber 

 been sold in that way, the return would 

 be $125,000. However, limiting the posts 

 to a diameter of 4 inches at the top. with- 

 out utilizing the smaller sizes, made the 

 cut needlessly wasteful. Thousands of 

 good, straight pieces only a little below 

 the diameter limit were left on the ground 

 to decay. They might easily have been 

 removed and sold as second-class posts at 

 from 5 to 8 cents each; and had this 

 waste thus been prevented, the returns 

 from the cut would have been sufficiently 

 increased to make the two estimates very 

 nearly equal. 



[This tract of 640 acres was cleared (lurint,^ the 

 3-ear 1904 and realized lioo.ooo for the Frisco 

 Railway. — Ed.] 



Numerous tables are here quoted show- 

 ing the percentage of sap and heartwood. 

 This shows that the high percentage of 

 heartwood is found even in the verv 

 young trees, and that practically it is un- 

 influenced by the rate of growth. The 

 five-year-old sprouts on Blocks IX, X and 

 XI of the Yaggy plantation have grown 

 very rapidly, yet they show as much 

 heartwood as the slowest-growing trees 

 (Block I) of the Farlington forest. It 

 permits of but one conclusion. In the 

 early growth of the Hardy Catalpa 

 neither age nor rate of growth affects to 

 any great extent the relative amount of 

 heartwood. It is generally recognized 

 that the sapwood of the Catalpa does not 

 greatly resist decay when used in or on 

 the ground, nor does sapwood of any tim- 

 ber. Numerous instances are known both 

 in the case of young and old timber of 

 the sapwood decaying and leaving the 

 heartwood intact after a few vears' usaee 

 in the soil. However^ since the sapwood 

 forms so small a part of the tree, its decay 

 is of but little importance. The heart- 

 wood of both young and old timber 

 shows great longevity in the ground. 

 Bulletin No. 108, of the Kansas Experi- 

 ment Station, shows a photograph of an 

 eight-year-old fence post which had been 

 in the ground constantly for twelve years. 

 The heartwood was still in a perfect state 

 of preservation. Plate XIX shows a sec- 

 tion of a fence post which had been in the 

 ground thirty-eight years. The section 

 was taken right at the surface of the 

 ground where decay is always most rapid. 

 Deeper in the ground this post was per- 

 fectly solid. This section, it should be ex- 

 plained, was from an old tree which had 

 made very slow growth. 



So far as the durability of its timber is 

 concerned, however, the investigations of 

 the Bureau of Forestrv seem to show that 



