511 JOURNAI. OF FORESTRY 



ownership of the farm woodlands of the State, chiefly in the prairie, 

 bluff, and shortleaf-pine regions ; encourage, also, the practice of for- 

 estry on large units of private land, under the tax-abatement law, in the 

 shortleaf and longleaf pine regions ; 



(2) Protect against fire the longleaf and a portion of the shortleaf 

 pine regions, and 



(3) Acquire for permanent State ownership and administer as State 

 forests the true forest soils of the longleaf-pine region and of the short- 

 leaf-pine region wherever occurring in units of administrative size. 



As these policies are stated, they inevitably require a knowledge of 

 our soils, obtainable only through land classification. 



Upon our ability to make all of the work which we may undertake 

 in Louisiana count toward the attainment of the objects set before us 

 in the forest policy thus stated would seem to depend the success of 

 the State forestry organization. The work done up to 1918 by the 

 department consisted of a general propaganda preached by the com- 

 missioner himself and by the conservation agents, paid out of fish and 

 game licenses, and the establishment of the Urania Forest Preserve 

 under co-operative agreement with the Urania Lumber Company. 

 During 1918, when the forestry law of 1916 first became effective and 

 gave the department a portion of the severance tax on timber and tur- 

 pentine, the forestry work was expanded, under the direction of a 

 trained forester, to include the beginning of a State fire-protective sys- 

 tem, and a general survey of the forestry needs of the State was made. 

 Approximately $12,000 was spent for all purposes during 191 8, half of 

 which was provided out of the general fund of the department, the 

 severance tax collections being temporarily far below expectations ; 

 $1,400 of Federal funds and $8,000 of State funds were spent for fire 

 protection. Passage was secured of a law providing for the adminis- 

 tration as a State forest of an existing game preserve of some six thou- 

 sand acres, but the State's title to the land has been questioned and the 

 matter is in abeyance. Propaganda and the slow process of education 

 have been continued. Having made a good start, the department looks 

 forward to increasing usefulness in the field of forestry during the 

 years before it. 



