FORESTRY AS AN EMPLOYMENT. 471 



state forest lands. It is probable that other states will follow, and 

 this will demand a limited number of trained men. 



The chief of the forestry department at Washington has been agi- 

 tating for the establishment of a national forestry service, but it all 

 hinges on congressional action, and this will not come until the peo- 

 ple are educated to see the need of it. 



Forestry work by private individuals is at present confined chiefly 

 to the lumbermen, and they require men skilled only in the estima- 

 tion and cutting of timber and the production of timberin the 

 cheapest possible manner without regard to the continuation of the 

 supply. 



As for teachers in forestry, there will be no demand for these until 

 a demand for foresters creates a demand for forestry schools. What 

 little demand there is for forestry education at the present time is 

 met by the instructors in the kindred sciences of horticulture and 

 botanj', and this expedient will no doubt be sufficient for a number 

 of years. 



If the question of opportunities for services for public welfare be 

 applied as a criterion to " Forestry as an Employment," it will by no 

 means suffer. There are few fields in which the public weal can be 

 so materially benefited as by work in forestrj', and if a person is so 

 situated that he can afiford to work gratuitously for a number of 

 years he can find a great opportunity for good work in this line. 

 The magnificent system of forestry management in Europe is due 

 to the warnings of a few far seeing men uttered for the first timeless 

 than a century ago. The average European of the latter part of last 

 century was possessed of about the same ideas as the average Amer- 

 ican is to day, viz., that the forest supply is practicallj' inexhaus- 

 tible, that forests are of but little benefit except for fuel and lumber 

 and that the fire and the ax are two of the greatest aids in render- 

 ing the country habitable. The European countries lived to pay 

 dearly for these ideas, and it behooves the American people to profit 

 by their experience and institute a system of forest management be- 

 fore their principal forests are destroyed. To make the general 

 public see the necessity for this requires a great amount of educa- 

 tional agitation, and here lies the field of the forester of today. 



After some time of such educational agitation the people will be- 

 come alive to the necessity of scientific forestry, a demand for 

 trained men will be created, and forestry will take its place as an 

 employment beside those of horticulture and agriculture. 



Mr. G. J. Kellogg: I would like to ask the last gentleman a 

 question in regard to forestry. Have you given the question 

 any study as to how best to protect and replant our denuded 

 forests? 



Mr. Stene: No, I have not. I have been reading some of 

 the way they carry out the work in Germany, but. of course, 

 with our high labor and undeveloped country it would be diffi- 

 cult to carry out any such plan. It would probably have to be 

 done b}'' protecting from fires and letting the forests grow up 

 naturally. 



