NOTES AND COMMENTS 513 



In addition to the business feature of the management, the tract will 

 be used for extended experimental work in silviculture. The variety 

 of age classes and species makes it specially adapted to this purpose. 



Mr. Cox, State Forester of Minnesota, foreshadows the more 

 general use of aviators for forest-fire patrol after the experience with 

 such a patrol in Wisconsin, and compares the cost with regular foot 

 patrol. In the latter, to every 1,000,000 acres twenty-two patrolmen 

 would be needed, or 110 for a unit of 5,000,000 acres, who would cost 

 around $60,000 for the six months' fire season, which, if it is assumed 

 that $100,000,000 of value is to be found on the area, brings the cost 

 to .06 per cent. 



A hydroplane, which is the kind to use in the lake-studded northern 

 forest, lasting three years, costs $7,750 per annum ; repairs, $600 ; two 

 aviators, at $200 per month, and two observers, at $100, besides a 

 mechanic, at $80, brings the crew charge for five months to $4,080, and 

 the total for 5,000,000 acres to $12,430, or about one-fifth of the foot 

 patrol. Considering, however, that the latter cannot be entirely dis- 

 pensed with, allowing twenty-five foot patrols, the net saving in aerial 

 patrol figures $25,880, {. e., cutting the cost in half or better. — Ameri- 

 can Forestry, February, 1917, p. 107. 



B. W. Lakin, superintendent of the Crookston Lumber Company, 

 at Bemidji, Minnesota, reports that the company for the past ten years 

 has pursued the policy of burning their slash on over 10,000 acres a 

 year; this in stands of mixed conifers, with an average of 8,000 feet 

 to the acre, cut to a 6-inch log. The brush is piled while logging (with 

 a Lidgerwood cableway) and burned in the early spring before the fire 

 can run (before May 1), under careful supervision. This is done with 

 a kerosene torch made of 1^-inch gas pipe, capped at one end, and a 

 reducer from 1^ to 3^-inch on the other end, and a piece of ^-inch 

 pipe, 10 inches long, filled with wicking. The torch will last with one 

 oil filling for two to three hours. The cost need not be over 50 cents, 

 and averages between 10 and 20 cents per acre, or, say, 2 cents per M 

 feet. — Canadian Forestry Journal, March, 1917, p. 1003. 



The last session of the Idaho State Legislature passed a workmen's 

 compensation act, to some extent similar to the act now in force in 



