A PLAN ADEQUATE TO MEET OUR NEEDS FOR WOOD TIMBER. 79 



the consumption of European countries was inevitable, this 

 change would not be made readily. 



Dr Fernow then quoted from the report of the National 

 Conservation Commission to the effect that the cut was more 

 than twice the annual growth and that there was then (1907) 

 hardly thirty years' supply in sight, so there was no time for dilly- 

 dallying. 



He urged that fire protection and conservative logging would 

 not meet the need, as these were concerned with the utilisation of 

 the existing crop but did nothing to insure a new crop. 



It was true that fire protection was essential to forestry, as 

 no one would invest money with a high fire hazard ; but fire 

 protection had been so much improved of late years that the 

 time was more propitious for pressing for reforestation. 



Holding that, in spite of substitutes, timber would continue to 

 be used and would continue to increase in price, and also that 

 the natural regeneration method of timber reproduction would be 

 found nearly as costly and far less effective than replanting, he 

 wished to go on record as holding the opinion that " our future 

 needs can not be satisfactorily and adequately provided for until 

 we take recourse to planting operations on a large scale." 



Within twenty years the United States would have reached the 

 point where virgin timber, in which natural regeneration might 

 still be practised, would be near its end. The country's needs 

 must then be supplied chiefly from the so-called second growth 

 and volunteer growth ; and the area capable of restocking only 

 by artificial means would have increased probably to 250,000,000 

 acres, over half the remaining forest soil. (Dr Fernow estimated 

 that in 1907 the forest area of the United States was 580 million 

 acres.) Then the people would be forced to plant whether they 

 believed in that method or not. 



It was useless to expect private enterprise to undertake this 

 task owing to the long time element involved. The railways, 

 needing a constant supply of ties, and paper companies, whose 

 big plants were built with the idea of continuous forest supplies, 

 might embark in tree planting, but Dr Fernow was afraid that 

 for the rest they would have to abandon the idea of individual 

 endeavour and learn that community interests must be attended 

 to by the community. In the end only the State and the 

 municipality could be expected to provide for a distant future. 

 There were foolish notions abroad as to the distance of that 



