36 PRELIMINARY EXAMINATION OF THE 



is uninjured by long periods of inundation. Its wood is 

 valuable for many uses. With plenty of sunlight and 

 deep mellow soil, cottonwood will grow at the rate of an 

 inch a year in diameter for about the first ten years. It 

 may be cut for saw-timber at an age of about thirty-five 

 years, when the trees will have an average breasthigh 

 diameter of 24 inches. To obtain the best results in the 

 management of cottonwood stands, thinnings are advis- 

 able when the trees are about ten years of age. The 

 material removed by this thinning will in most instances 

 be too small for use, but the expense of the work will be 

 more than offset by the future benefit to the stand. When 

 the trees are fifteen or twenty years old there should be 

 a second thinning, to leave the largest and healthiest 

 trees standing about fifteen feet apart. After these thin- 

 nings the stand will grow very rapidly. The material 

 removed by the second thinning can be utilized for pulp- 

 wood, match manufacttire and other purposes. 



Growth studies of oaks, hickory, ash, red gum and 

 cypress show that these species can be grown to an average 

 breasthigh diameter of 20 inches in from forty-five to fifty 

 years in the delta region. 



The chief points of forest management in the Yazoo 

 delta may be summarized as follows: 



I. The sandy ridges now chiefly covered with syca- 

 more and the swampy areas which will not be reclaimed 

 for agriculture should be kept as forest lands. 



2. These lands shotild be devoted to the valuable 

 trees, and so far as is practicable the undesirable trees 

 should be removed in logging operations. 



3. Rapid growth of young stands should be induced 

 by improvement cuttings and thinnings. 



Ownership and Values of Land. — ^In the Yazoo delta the 

 large areas of timber land where there are very few farms 

 are, for the most part, controlled by large lumber com- 

 panies. It has been the policy of these companies to buy 

 up all the good timber land which could be obtained, cut 

 the valuable species, such as the oaks, cypress and ash, 



