120 JOURNAL OF FORESTRY 



A Glimpse of the Siberian Forests.^ 



In 1913, Fridtjof Nansen made an interesting journey by boat 

 through the polar seas to the mouth of the Yenisei River, up this great 

 waterway as far as Krasno-Yarsk; thence northwesterly beyond Tomsk 

 and easterly via the Trans-Siberian Railway to Vladivostok. As a 

 result of this trip he tells of the great future for the development of the 

 rich Siberian agricultural soils — such as is rapidly taking place in north- 

 ern Canada. In the account of his journeys he gives enough brief 

 references to the forest wealth (or poverty) of the country to excite the 

 desire for more data and data of an exact character. What an oppor- 

 tunity for some Russian to describe "The Forest Resources of Siberia." 



At the mouth of the Yenisei, Nansen noted a "lighter . . . filled 

 with great beams of Siberian cedar, deal and pine"- — ^presumably for 

 export to Europe! Here on Nosonovski Island (roughly 75° north 

 latitude and 80° east longitude) he speaks of stretches of "osier scrub 

 ... as high as one's chest . . . also some alder." 



The first real tree grow1:h on the Yenisei was at latitude 69° 43', near 

 Khetnisky Island, opposite Krestova. "They were small larches 

 {Larix siherica.) There were not many of them. They were scattered 

 over the ground and looked more like bushes than anything else." 

 Two and a half degrees further south Nansen describes forests of "larches 

 and firs {Ahies siherica) and the Siberian cedar {Pinus cembra) which is 

 also beginning . . . (but) chiefly yellow birch, with some alders and 

 osiers among it, and scattered splashes of red mountain ash. The 

 coniferous forest has been destroyed by fire over and over again in 

 course of time along this river" — owing to careless camp fires which 

 "nobody takes any notice of. . . . The forest has no value. So it has 

 gone on from time immemorial." Perhaps the most interesting refer- 

 ence to these northern forests is the following : 



"Another curious thing is that all this forest is so thin ... all these 

 trees here grow on frozen soil. On the top there is a shallow layer which 

 thaws in the stimmer, but underneath the soil is eternally frozen. . . . 

 The roots of the trees cannot, therefore, strike down, and must grow 

 horizontally along the ground near the surface. Even the fir^ cannot 

 strike its tap-roots downwards here, as it would immediately come upon 

 frozen soil and ice. It will, therefore, be understood that these trees 

 must have more room for their roots. ..." Thus Nansen accounts 

 for wide spacing by root competition in the luifrozen surface soil, instead 



1 Fridtjof Nansen. (Translated by Arthur G. Chater.) 



"Through Siberia: The Land of the Future." Frederick A. Stokes Co. New 

 York, 1914. P. 477. 



2 Nansen is evidently not a trained forester. T. S. W., Jr. 



