FORESTRY RECONSTRUCTION. 73 



been fortunate in the circumstances in which their labour was 

 undertaken, circumstances which compel action of some kind to 

 be taken. They were also fortunate in the fact that a great deal 

 of spade-work had been accomplished by previous committees 

 in the same field, and, therefore, they were independent of the 

 necessity of calling witnesses. While they were at work, they 

 had before their eyes the daily depletion of existing woods to 

 meet the urgent needs of the war and of industry, and the dis- 

 quieting fact that in spite of the great consumption of home- 

 grown timber, no means were available of making an estimate 

 of our remaining resources or even of gauging accurately the 

 rate and volume of wastage. 



Only recently, in answer to a question put by Sir John Fleming 

 to the Secretary of the Board of Trade in the House of Commons, 

 the Department admitted its inability to give the acreage of 

 coniferous timber cut in England, Scotland, and Ireland during 

 the war, and an estimate of the acreage standing before the war, 

 and added that the labour of obtaining the figures asked for 

 could not be undertaken at present. It is only fair to the Board 

 of Trade to say that that timber supply had at that time only 

 lately been transferred to the Board from the War Office. 



But the fact that such an answer had to be given to an enquiry 

 concerning a vital industry shows very clearly the need of an 

 efficient department of forestry. Such a department would not 

 only have been in possession of the information required, but 

 would itself have been able, with some temporary increase of 

 staff, to undertake the organisation of the Home-Grown Timber 

 Supply during the war. It should be said that every elTort is now 

 being made, under the Scottish Branch of Timber Supply, to collect 

 statistics of vital importance both to an estimate of our existing 

 resources and of future possibilities. Hitherto any statistics as 

 to the volume of timber grown and rate of growth have been 

 collected by private individuals, and cover a relatively very 

 small proportion of our woods, and it is very satisfactory that an 

 endeavour is now being made to collect these statistics, the 

 foundation-stone of scientific forestry, before certain classes of 

 wood have almost or entirely disappeared. The report gives 

 100,000 acres as the best estimate which the Sub Committee 

 have been able to form of the total area clear-felled during the 

 war up to April 1917. This estimate is already out of date, and 

 it must be remembered that there is every inducement to fell 



