THE CONIFEROUS FORESTS OF EASTERN NORTH AMERICA. I9I 



This tree is confined to situations rarely or never visited by 

 fire, being protected either by the scarcity of undergrowth, or by 

 the topography, or both. It is probably very sensitive to fire, 

 especially when young. 



Formerly the hemlock was valued chiefly as a source of tan- 

 bark, and it was once, and still is, in many places as far apart as 

 Michigan and Georgia, a common practice to cut the trees for 

 their bark alone, and leave the logs to rot in the woods. At 

 present it is used largely also for lumber and pulp-wood. The 

 leading states in the production of hemlock lumber in 1909, in 

 proportion to area, were Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, West 

 Virginia, Michigan, New Hampshire, Vermont, Maine, New 

 York, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maryland and Virginia, in 

 the order named. (The first four of these, as well as Vermont, 

 New York and Maryland, cut more hemlock than white pine.) 



The Pitch Pine (JPinus rigida) ranges from New Brunswick 

 and Ohio to the mountains of Georgia, but seems to form 

 extensive pure stands only in south-eastern Massachusetts, 

 eastern Long Island, and southern New Jersey. Such forests 

 usually have a dense undergrowth of two shrubby oaks {Quercus 

 ilicifolia and Q. prinoides), with poor sandy soils, and the ground- 

 water level fairly constant throughout the year. 



In its relations to fire the pitch pine seems to be intermediate 

 between the spruces already mentioned and some of the southern 

 pines. The pine-barrens of Long Island and New Jersey every- 

 where bear the marks of fire, which seems usually not to kill the 

 older trees. Further studies of this point are needed. 



This tree is usually too small, crooked or knotty to be of much 

 value for lumber, but where it is abundant it has been used for 

 many purposes, especially in the early days before transportation 

 facilities enabled better woods to compete with it so strongly. 

 The soil in which it grows is of little value for ordinary agri- 

 culture, but in wet places among the pines, especially in 

 Massachusetts and New Jersey, large crops of cranberries are 

 gathered. The pine region of New Jersey formerly produced 

 considerable quantities of bog iron ore ^ and glass sand.- 



The Red Cedar {/uniperus Virginiand) grows nearly through- 

 out eastern North America between — but hardly overlapping — 



^ There is an interesting sketch of the old iron industry in southern New 

 Jersey, by Gifford, in The ropula7- Science Monthly for April 1893. 

 ^ See The Popular Science Monthly, vol. xlii. pp. 442, 830, 1893. 



