906 JOURNAL OF FORESTRY 



Most of the diameter-limit cuttings have been based on guesswork. 

 Some one thought, or hoped, that a 12 or 14 inch Hmit would give a 

 sustained yield, and then the loggers cut as they pleased. The result 

 of the diameter-limit cutting is that many large corporations are hunt- 

 ing for timber lands in other localities to help supply the mills, because 

 their present holdings do not yield as they were supposed to. 



Following is a quotation from a letter from Prof. R. C. Hawley. 

 of the Yale Forest School : 



. . . "I should divide the northern country into hardwood land and softwood 

 land, the former being mixed stands of hardwood and softwood. The fact that 

 hardwoods are maintaining themselves in the virgin forest in competition with 

 the softwoods indicates that the latter cannot reproduce abundantly on this type 

 of land. A selection cutting to 12 or 14 inches leaves so few softwoods that a 

 second cut in 20 years hardly pays, and, furthermore, provides too few seed 

 trees to get reproduction. On this land one of two things seems advisable: 

 either cut to the lowest merchantable limit or leave all the softwood standing. 

 This last scheme is being tried at Nehasane^ Park in the second cutting, which 



they are now carrying on under a forester's supervision. They secured very little 

 reproduction on hardwood land after the first cutting. Here, however, they com- 

 bine the plan with the cutting of all the hardwoods that are salable. It leaves 

 plenty of softwood for the next cut and for seed. The logging of the hard- 

 woods tears up the litter considerably and gives a better chance for softwood 

 to start than existed before the cutting. Where you cannot cut the hard- 

 woods, I think it is an absolutely hopeless proposition to get an increase of 

 softwoods in the future forest. Why not get the softwood out entirely and 

 expect a hardwood stand? You never can make the land really productive, once 

 the virgin softwood is cut, until the hardwoods are salable. Then they can be 

 removed to make way for conifers or grown as the desired crop. 



"Another point against a selection cutting of spruce on hardwood land is that 

 the trees you naturally leave below the limit are all of them suppressed trees and 

 standing still in growth. Unless the hardwoods die or are cut these suppressed 

 trees will continue to stand still. In other words, your investment of trees left 

 below the limit is going to return no interest unless it be due to rise in prices. 



"You ask my opinion as to the difference in reproduction of softwoods on 

 hardwood land when the softwoods are cut to 12 inches or 14 inches, as con- 

 trasted to cutting them to the lowest merchantable limit. I do not think the 

 difference would be great, because the cutting of the trees below the 12-inch limit 

 means very little more opening up the stand, and these trees being suppressed 

 mainly add little to the amount of seed produced." 



The defect of the diameter limit showed up very well in the tract 

 studied. Repeated borings were made in trees throughout the hard- 

 wood type. The results, as far as any increased growth was concerned, 

 were negative, for the reasons given above, namely, the trees left were 



^ Nehasane Park is in the Adirondack Mountains. 



