FOREST commissioner's REPORT. 25 



Whoever goes north from Flagstaff goes across Fhigstaff 

 pond and not around it. The reason for this is that two 

 great bogs border the pond on the east and west. Of these 

 the westerly one, lying along the main inlet, is the larger, 

 reaching nearly or quite to the Eustis line. These two bogs 

 cover, together, an area of several square miles, and make, 

 with the pond, a big hole in the timber-bearing area of the 

 town. 



A tramp of two miles northwest from the pond q'^™^^-^ ^'^^• 

 brought us out into the burn of 188G, lately men- "i'"''"- 

 tioned. Here there w^as nothing to interfere with the view — 

 for ten miles in the northerly direction was one unbroken 

 burn. As to the trees growing up on this hurnt land, woods- 

 men need not be told that those most in evidence were white 

 birch and poplar. Clumps of maple sprouts were plentiful, 

 coming up from old stems that had not been entirely killed. 

 The growth of all these species is rapid. Poplars particularly, 

 in the eight years since the fire, had, some of them, reached 

 a height of fifteen feet and a diameter of two inches. This, 

 however, was only on regions possessing a li])eral soil. 



A tramp of about eight miles through the burn ^j^,^.,^ j^,^,^ 

 brought us to Bartlett pond. Securing board in spi^K.". 

 the sportsman's camp located here, two days were 

 spent on the Pratt tract so-called, a tract of 11,500 acres in 

 III R. V, which except for the pine taken from it thirty years 

 or more ago had never yet been cut. But if not cut it has 

 by no means been free from destruction. Striking into it on 

 an easterly course, thinking by systematic travel to see a fair 

 sample of its timber, the first half day's tramp led through an 

 alternation of hard wood growth with blowdown. The timber 

 when it was reached was not even or laro-e. It stood on little 

 rocky knolls or ridges alternating with swampy ground filled 

 with trees of little value and almost every kind. In fact it 

 seemed probable after two days looking around that ahnost 

 all the sjjruce and pine timber on this tract stands on not 

 over a third of the land. A big ridge coming in from Hol)bs- 

 town on the north is almost pure hard w'ood. liecent fires 



