REPORT OF THE STATE BOTANIST I9QI3 57 
with pine on the Ysenburg range and in the Frankfurt forests one 
might suppose that oak is usually a failure here, but such is not the 
case. Above the frost dells it succeeds very well, and indeed, the 
primeval forests of this region contained some of the largest and 
finest oaks of the world, a few of which are still to be seen on the 
Mittledick range. The Frankfurt forest contains a plantation of 
oak, nearly 100 years old, with subservient natural undergrowth of 
beech and hornbeam which looks as good as any of the natural re- 
generation of oak seen in the Spessarts, so famous for its oaks. 
Here in the Rhine valley, however, the beech shows a tendency to 
become the dominant tree if not held in check. This stand of oak 
contains, including the beech, some of which are of merchantable 
size, 19,000 board feet to the acre. 
The annual net revenue of the Frankfurt town forests is $16 a 
hectare, or about $6.50 an acre, in spite of the fact that many a 
sacrifice is made for landscape and recreation purposes. 
5 THE ODENWALD 
The Odenwald (plate 7) is a hilly or semimountainous region 
of considerable extent lying east of the Rhine valley and north of 
the Neckar river and Heidelberg.. The underlying formation is 
granite at lower elevations and chiefly sandstone at the highest 
elevations, a factor which, taken in connection with the absence of 
limestone, has played a very important part in the development of 
forestry in some parts of the Odenwald. 
The deep, broad valleys of the Odenwald are devoted largely to 
agriculture, while the steepest slopes and higher summits are given 
over to forests. The primeval growth of this region was entirely 
hardwoods, but the region is rapidly changing in aspect as the 
extensive planting of conifers (spruce, fir and pine) which has 
been going on for the past hundred years begins to dominate the 
landscape (plate 8). 
Out of the many interesting ranges in the Odenwald it would be 
hard to pick any one which is typical of the whole region. Each 
range, in which some particular policy has been carried out for a 
‘long term of years, presents features peculiarly different from 
every other range. 
The policy of the state has been to acquire by purchase the small 
woodlands belonging to the farmers. The latter, however, finding 
the raising of Christmas trees remunerative, are not anxious to 
sell, and it is quite curious that within the state of Hesse, which 
