252 Forestry Quarterly. 



underbrush, made up mainly of the two tree species mentioned is, 

 however, as stated, not very dense, except in spots. 



The openness of the main stand may be judged from the state- 

 ment that, as developed by some 1200 acres of sample area, less 

 than 1.4 tree of commercial size per acre was found. When it is 

 considered that over 100 species participate in making up this stand, 

 the difficulty of a commercial or even botanical survey will be rea- 

 lized. 



Nothing is more puzzling than to discover a law of distribution. 

 After many days of cruising over canyon, slope and ridge, one finds 

 in identically the same kind of location a new species, a single tree 

 or group, never to be seen again in further cruisings. Nearly 400 

 miles had been traveled before the first group of Ebony was met. 

 Under such conditions it is nlmost futile to attempt to formulate a 

 law of distribution or to determine the frequency of occurrence of 

 any one species, and still less its part in the commercial composition. 

 Nevertheless some approximation to these questions was necessary, 

 and the results of 1200 acres of sample areas will, at least, be bet- 

 ter than a mere guess, for the region in which this sampling was 

 done. 



The sampling was done by the old-fashioned, newly-named chain 

 method, substituting for the chain a pedometer, checked by time for 

 the distance traveled, and estimating all trees within 50 feet on each 

 side, when a mile will represent 12 1-2 acres. For such rough sur- 

 veying the use of the pedometer in knowing hands, after having 

 adjusted it for personal equation and character of ground, has 

 proved itself a useful instrument, of course only for establishing 

 large averages of distances. Especially when frequently checked 

 by time and making judiciously allowances for change of condi- 

 tions, it will be found far better than the cruiser's mere opinion on 

 the matter of distance at the end of a day's run. The accompany- 

 ing map was largely based on these measurements, and the checking 

 of points by plane-table method proved them remarkably satisfac- 

 tory. 



This sampling gave on about half the acreage, or over 50 miles 

 run, which represented a fair proportion of the various topographic 

 types, the following results as regards participation of the various 

 species in the make-up of the forest. 



