378 MINNESOTA STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



V 



The object in making- the Biltmore case so conspicuous in this re- 

 port is to show that order can be instituted in the forests of Minne- 

 sota, where the conditions are similar. The assurances of success 

 are at least 50 per cent, ahead of the venture in North Carolina. Our 

 lumber territor3^ our transportation by water and rail, our mill facil- 

 ities, our lumber and fuel markets, are superior in everj' particular. 

 We have at least a hundred-fold more raw material to utilize than 

 North Carolina or any other southern forested state. 



What hinders Minnesota, then, from undertaking- to commence a 

 forest improvement system, not exactlj^ after the pattern of Bilt- 

 more, but as our privilege warrants for business enterprise? We 

 have no time to brood over the ruined condition of our forests, nor 

 to berate any one for producing those conditions. Let us accept 

 the situation and see if we cannot make it pay to bring order out of 

 chaos. 



We cannot reasonablj^ anticipate that lumbermen will pause in 

 their work to consider experimental methods, or turn back to recon- 

 struct where forest injury has been wrought. Even if they were 

 convinced that scientific forestrj^ is the most profitably economic in 

 the long run, it is questionable whether they would or could con- 

 sistently accept the new responsibilities. Their investments, their 

 chances to compete for the mastery, their lumbering shipments, 

 positively forbid anj' departure from the lines thej' are pursuing, as 

 viewed from the pending business standpoint. We naust be content 

 with the facts that,really, they are friends of scientific forestry, and 

 do countenance the object we have in view, but are not ready to 

 adopt it. 



Need the matter in hand be viewed as merely experimental? Ger- 

 many, France and other European nationalities have demonstrated 

 that scientific forestrj' paj^s among the millions to the state, to say 

 nothing of the agricultural advantages accuring therefrom. Minne- 

 sota owns vast tracks of swamp lands, raided by thieves, subject to 

 annual fires that seriousl}' injure the soil; lands which, after the 

 timber is cleared, remain idle, weary and desolate. Is it not practical 

 economy to make them pay something to the state by enhancing 

 their value for sale in the future or, better, by keeping them as re- 

 serves in trust and under constant improvement for the benefit of 

 our successors? 



Prof. S. B. Green suggests the feasibility of utilizing a large tract, 

 a whole township, perhaps, of the university lands as a branch ex- 

 perimental station in the northern part of the state, located among 

 the lakes there and protected bj^ the native trees. The chances cer- 

 tainly are excellent. Under proper management it would more than 

 pay for itself, and be of immeaeureable benefit to the state. It is 

 ardently hoped that our regents will give the suggestion the delib- 

 erate attention it deserves. 



