FORESTRY SURVEY 259 



In the southern half of the township the stream has cut 

 its yalley so deeply that some of the steeper slopes show a 

 tendency to guUey when they are stripped of their forest 

 cover. Otherwise the land is almost all tillable, of good 

 quality, and valuable for agricultural purposes. 



DiMMiCK Township (Map II). 



Here the essential features of topography observed in 

 Troy Grove Township are repeated; the western half pos- 

 sessing throughout a rich prairie soil with its typical 

 vegetation while the forested areas are confined to the 

 eastern half where the}' are associated with the Little Ver- 

 milion and its tributary. Tomahawk Creek. Here the Ver- 

 milion lias cut its channel to a depth of 60 to 100 feet and 

 the flood plain reaches a width of 200 yards. With the 

 stream valleys are associated the "timber soils," approx- 

 imately 5300 acres in extent. Doubtless all of this area 

 was originally forested but fully seven-eighths of it has 

 been cleared and is now under cultivation or in pasture. 

 In 1918, about 6S0 acres remained in forest while over 

 300 acres more showed stumps in a good state of preserva- 

 tion indicating recent cutting. 



'&• 



With the deeper channeling of the Little Vermilion the 

 underlying rock is reached and in general the stream is 

 now entrenched in a channel of either sandstone or lime- 

 stone, both rocks appearing upon the slopes of the stream 

 valley. Upon these steep river bluffs in addition to the 

 oak, maple, basswood, etc., there appear snuiU amounts of 

 red cedar, white pine, ser^'ice berry and water beech. The 

 flood plains are often very completely cleared, only iso- 

 lated trees of such species as walnut, elm, sycamore, ash 

 and maple remaining. 



Tomahawk Creek had originally a rather narrow forest 

 fringe which has now largely disappeared, the isolated 

 patches remaining constituting not more than 25 acres in 

 Sections 12, 13, 23 and 21. These patches are much 

 culled, closely grazed and composed almost exclusively 

 of second growth timber from 6 to 12 inches in diameter, 

 the principal trees, in order of their importance being bur 

 oak. black oak and shagbark hickory. 



