as STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



stripping tlie same of the few remaining small trees. The finest specimens 

 of second-growth timber we have are where the land was practically 

 cleared — old abandoned farms, or as in the vicinity of Noi^thport, Leland 

 and Glen Arbor, where for years the steamers on the great lakes took 

 wood for fuel and the timber was cut clean for this purpose. ^V"hereve^ 

 these lands were not made into farms they have made a splendid show- 

 ing in second-growth timber, now from thirty to forty years old and 

 already considered as nearly' equal in value to the original timber. 



To recapitulate: First, secure a good title to the best land you can 

 get. Second, save as many seed trees as possible before or at the time 

 the lumbering is done, mark the same and make a special penalty for 

 destroying them. Third, insist upon the timber being cut clean when it 

 is cut. Fourth, burn early in the spring. Fifth, assist nature to seed. 

 Finally, guard against stock grazing, fires, and a fickle i)olicy on the 

 part of the State. 



METHODS OF REFORESTING CUT-OVER LANDS IN MICHIGAN. 



BY PROP. E. E. BOGUE^ MICHIGAN AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE. 



When the white man first came into Michigan to settle, his first atten- 

 tion was probably given to the trees, to use up and destroy them. As 

 soon as he began to do this, he disturbed nature's plan w^hich is to keep 

 an equal balance in the forest, under normal and natural conditions. 

 Nature dealt forests generously to many parts of Michigan. In some 

 parts it would have been difficult for man to improve the stand, but it 

 was comparatively easy for him to disturb the balance in any section. 

 No geologist can tell us very accurately the length of time it took nature 

 to bring forest conditions to the point at which man found them. The 

 ripe generation which he found was about two hundred and fifty years 

 old and this was by no means the first one. 



Judging by what nature has done in some parts of this State during 

 the past twenty-five years in her attempts at reforesting the waste 

 areas, we may safely presume that a much longer period than tw^o hun- 

 dred and fifty years will be necessary for her, unaided, to reforest the 

 denuded areas. To be sure, in places where there is a good start of 

 Norway or White pine the promise is very favorable. On the other 

 hand, in some places there is next to no promise from nature to restore 

 the crop; namely, where there has been no seeding and no seedlings. 



If we go through a tract of woods in tlie southern ])art of the State 

 where all the merchantable timber has been removed, what do we find 

 nature doing? We find a bountiful growth of Hard maple, a good deal 

 of beech; many of the older trees dead at the top, some of them hollow 

 or rotten at the butt, and scattered among these are a few young elm, 

 bitternut. White and Black ash, bassw^ood, sassafras, ironwood, several 

 species of oak and many other species, of less importance. The growth 

 of nearly every one of these which attains merchantable size for lum- 

 ber has been verv slow\ Where we have such conditions we can assist 



