FOREST commissioner's REPORT. 13 



yielded in the past will be constant for all time to come. Can 

 it be a matter of wonder then, when the owner himself is so 

 indifferent, that the operator — the person cutting under a 

 permit — is even more so, and tliat the lumber is cut in a very 

 wasteful and indiscriminate manner? 



To bring out a little more prominently the matter of waste, 

 I will quote what I've heard said repeatedly by our best 

 and most practical lumbermen. They state that if to-day we 

 could have what lumber was actually wasted in cutting our 

 old stock of pine for which the State was once so noted, it 

 would l)e worth more than was received for the stock utilized. 



In most cases no restrictions whatever are placed on the 

 operators and they go to the woods, cut what they want, 

 destroy whatever comes in their way in shape of young grow- 

 ing timber with little or no attempt to save a thing that will 

 interfere with their w^ork in the least. In fact operators who 

 work under a permit as far as I have been a])le to observe 

 their methods, are absolutely indifferent to the interests of 

 the land owner. 



Xor is this to be w'ondered at very much when the facts 

 are considered. The proprietor is mainly interested in secur- 

 ing the largest possible revenues at the smallest possil)le 

 expense, and charges the operator the largest stumpage rate 

 that he can be made to pay. The operator on the other hand 

 during recent years has been obliged to sell his lumber at a 

 very limited price and consequently has been obliged to cut 

 his lumber in a way and manner that is most likely to yield 

 him a profit on his immediate work regardless of future 

 interests. 



The land owners fail to incorporate the needful restrictions 

 in making their permits for the simple reason that neither 

 they nor any one else really know what is necessary in the 

 Avay of restrictions. The subject never has been studied 

 enough in this country so that anybody can really be called 

 an authority upon it, and the results of foreign investi- 

 gations are not applicable in this State. There is actually 



