DIVISION OF FORESTRY. 171 



■will ultimately belong to the farmer, greatly increased by the artificial 

 plantations which are more and more spreading over the treeless jjlain. 



The danger appears greatest in the mountain regions, and unless 

 the State or National Government adopts a conservative policy little 

 hope can exist for the forests situated there. They are mostly so far 

 removed from agricultural lands as not to be easily included in farms, 

 and while, as shown before, their existence is almost a question of life 

 for the agriculture below, yet at x^resent the agriculturist has little 

 power for their control. 



On the Pacific slope the danger is not less pressing. The possibility 

 of getting small parcels of timber land (IGO acres), under the timber 

 and stone acts, having opened a more ready means of speculation in 

 the timber of these important mountain forests, their destruction, re- 

 gardless of consequences and new growth, is almost certain, unless 

 checked by a changed Government policy. 



The unimproved land in farms, but not in forests, can be said, at 

 least in the eastern half of the continent, to represent soil of little value 

 to agriculture but upon which forest growth is possible, and where 

 farmers should begin their artificial forestry. In the prairie States 

 this class of soil represents about 30 per cent., and while much of it 

 might no doubt be used for agriculture, it may well be asserted that, 

 if properly put into forest, this area would increase in prospective 

 value, and improve the conditions of the neighboring fields far beyond 

 the cost of such reforestation. 



The accompanying chart represents at a glance the interest which 

 the farmer has in the forest area still remaining, as well as the quan- 

 tity of unused soil in each section which can be devoted to forestry 

 as a profitable investment. Equal spaces denoting equal areas, the 

 total quantities, as well as the proportion to other forest areas, are at 

 once indicated to the eye. 



FOREST PLANTING AND MANAGEMENT IN THE UNITED STATES. 



So far as kno"\;\Ti in this office but very few extensive forest planta- 

 tions exist. These are notably the often-cited plantation of the Fort 

 Scott and Gulf Railroad and that of Mr. Hunnewell, near Farling- 

 ton, Kans., of about one section (640 acres) each; a plantation of Mr. 

 Burnett Laudreth, of 300 or more acres, in Virginia; and those of 

 the Messrs, Fay and others, along the sea-coast of New England. 

 From Southern California also are reported plantations of consider- 

 able extent. 



Small groves abound in the "Western, especially the prairie States, 

 and are found less frequently in the Eastern States, notably in Massa- 

 chusetts. In the aggregate these plantations must amount to quite 

 a considerable area, affording a hopeful prospect in respect to the 

 creation of new forests. This hopeful prospect does not exist in re- 

 gard to the remaining natural forests. With the exception of more 

 carefully conducted lumber operations in Maine, where there is less 

 recklessness than formerly in the destruction of young growth, and 

 beyond the rarely enforced rules in regard to cutting on Govern- 

 ment lands, recited in another place, no attempts at management, so 

 far as known at this ofl&ce, have been made; or if any have been made, 

 they are so isolated and primitive as hardly to deserve mention or the 

 name of management. 



The fencing out of cattle from newly cut deciduous forest, or even 

 from single stumps, to preserve the new growth — a precaution which 



