1885.] AFFORESTATION OF WASTE LANDS. 



THE BEST AXD MOST ECONOMICAL SYSTEM FOR THE 

 AFFORESTATION OF WASTE AND OTHERWISE 

 UNPROFITABLE LANDS IN THE UNITED KINGDOM. 



By William Macintosh, Assistant Forester, Lovat Estates Office, 

 Beauly, N.B. Being the First Prize Essay awarded by the 

 Scottish Seed and Nursery Trade Association, Session 1884. 



Part I. 



IN the present depressed state of agriculture, it is obvious to all, 

 especially so to landed proprietors, that the value of land is 

 deteriorating, and the annual income derived therefrom becoming 

 sadly reduced. The cry of the tenant-farmer is for a reduction of 

 rent, which in many cases wq have no doubt is required, as other- 

 wise the farms may become tenantless, but the proprietor must 

 sadly suffer. "What is to be done ? how is the loss to be retrieved ? 

 The prospects of the present are dark ; but is there not a ray of 

 hope for the future in the heading of this paper ? Is it not sug- 

 gestive of a sound investment and a profitable utilization of the 

 soil that now lies comparatively waste, or at most realizing only a 

 few shillings per acre ? There are millions of acres of such land in 

 this country that might be made to yield an annual rental of from 

 fifteen to thirty shillings per acre by judicious afforesting. 



The notes of alarm which issue from time to time from home 

 and foreign magazines and papers regarding the probable timber 

 famine at no distant period, have attracted the attention of political 

 economists and statesmen to the subject of afforestation of our 

 waste lands. 



The forests of America, which at one time seemed inexhaustible, 

 are fast disappearing before destructive fires, and the legitimate 

 requirements of an increasing population dispersed throughout the 

 treeless prairies, and their total extinction, cannot be long delayed 

 unless better methods are adopted for their protection and repro- 

 duction. Far-seeing men in the United States and Canada appre- 

 hend a period not very distant when the home demand will absorb 

 the growth of the forests, at least of the higher class of timber, such 

 as the White Pine (recognised as the Yellow Pine of commerce). 



As bearing upon this question, we quote the following statement 

 made by Professor C. S. Sargent, Special Agent in charge of Forestry 

 Statistics of the United States Census two years ago : — 



" The entire supply (White Pine) growing in the United States 

 and ready for the axe, does not to-day greatly, if at all, exceed 



