NOTES ON GERMINATION AND REPRODUCTION OF 

 LONGLEAF PINE IN SOUTHERN MISSISSIPPI. 



By p. L. Buttrick. 



In the spring of 1914 the final term of the senior class of the 

 Yale Forest School was held on the holdings of the Great South- 

 ern Lumber Company in Marion County, Mississippi. Marion 

 County adjoins the Louisiana State line on the south and is 

 drained by the Pearl River. 



The following data were partly collected by the students in 

 assigned work and later tabulated by the writer, who added ob- 

 servations of his own.^ They do not make a complete account 

 of Longleaf pine reproduction, but present some data which 

 may be of some value to others studying the problem. 



The region lies within the Longleaf pine belt in what is 

 known locally as the pine ridges. The surface of the country 

 is quite undulating and rather more hilly than most of this pine 

 land. The forest is pure Longleaf pine and practically all virgin. 

 The section has been settled for nearly a century, but save for 

 small agricultural clearings the forest has not been disturbed by 

 the ax. 



Since the first settlement forest fires have been an annual 

 occurrence. Early every spring the woods are burned over, 

 exposing the mineral soil, and, as a result, undergrowth is the 

 exception rather than the rule. While individual fires do little 

 damage to the mature timber, their cumulative efi^ect, by killing 

 the old trees and preventing the growth of others to take their 

 place, will probably be the gradual elimination of the forest. 

 Comparatively few trees under 100 or over 300 years are found. 

 The average age is about 220 years. What little reproduction 

 is found is in scattered groups and is totally insignificant in area 

 compared with the forest as a whole. It is evident that, if con- 

 ditions continue as they are, in another century the forest will 



^Acknowledgments are due to the Yale Forest School for permission 

 to use the data, and to Professor H. H. Chapman, of the School, for sug- 

 gestions as to field studv and criticisms of this paper. 



532 



