NOTES AND COMMENTS 817 



8. To prepare progress reports of operations. 



Some ten graduates and undergraduates are doing this kind of work, 

 besides supervising logging and milling operations, scaling, etc. 



Soon after the beginning of the war a need for Canadian wood-chop- 

 pers, loggers, and millmen was experienced in Great Britain, and later 

 in France, and so-called forestry battalions were organized for the 

 purpose of converting British and French timber into lumber, railroad 

 ties, material for trenches and roads, mining timbers, etc. 



Four such battalions have been raised in Canada and have proceeded 

 overseas, in addition to one battalion converted on arrival in England, 

 and about 4,500 men supplied from drafts from various parts of Can- 

 ada. Thus, all told, the number of men in Canadian forestry battalions 

 totals more than 10,000, in addition to a large number of men already 

 overseas who were formed into forestry companies. It is reported that 

 all the forestry battalions have been fused into a corps, into which rein- 

 forcements are drafted from the medically unfit of the infantry. 



While exploitation and not forestry was the object of these organiza- 

 tions, it is interesting to note that a number of Canadian foresters 

 enlisted for this work and found useful employment of their technical 

 knowledge, at least in Great Britain, in constructing volume tables, 

 estimating and appraising timber, measuring materials, and even making 

 forest descriptions and growth studies, the purpose of the latter serving 

 hardly any immediate needs. 



Following a recommendation by the Canadian Advisory Council for 

 Scientific and Industrial Research, loo square miles of the Petawawa 

 Military Reservation, Ontario, has been set aside by the Militia Depart- 

 ment as a forest experiment station, in co-operation with the Dominion 

 Forestry Branch. This area comprises about two-thirds of the total 

 reservation, all of which will still, however, be available for military 

 purposes, so far as needed. 



Petawawa is an artillery training camp, and a large portion of the 

 reservation is ordinarily not needed for military purposes. It is situ- 

 ated in a typical white-pine district, and was almost completely logged 

 ofif before the land was acquired by the Dominion Government. There 

 is, however, a fine stand of young forest growth, in addition to a limited 

 amoupt of larger material. 



A considerable amount of cordwood is cut each year for camp use 

 for fuel, etc.. and the Forestry Branch will supervise this cutting ac- 



