32 THE ADIRONDACK SPRUCE 
duce the diameter of the smallest tree cut from Io to 
6 inches is to double the number of individuals taken. 
In addition, the growth which would have taken place 
in the young thrifty Spruces in the next years is lost, 
and the ground produces hardwoods instead. 
In felling under the present system the loss is very 
serious in broken-top trees (not to be confounded with 
trees which have merely lost their leading shoots), which 
have been found to gain very slowly in diameter and 
height as compared with sound specimens, in young 
trees smashed and destroyed, and in young trees whose 
soundness is injured by the loss of bark. Not only are 
small trees broken and smothered by the tops of felled 
trees, but in heavy cutting the tops are often a serious 
hindrance to the germination of new seedlings. 
Further, where the soil is exposed to the sun and wind 
the moss and humus dry up and disappear, the small 
seedlings whose roots have not yet become established 
in the mineral soil are killed, and the germination of 
new seed is seriously delayed. At present this injury 
to the capital value of the forest receives no attention. 
Practical work in the woods has demonstrated that the 
cost of the care required to prevent this loss is so small 
as to be altogether insignificant, and wholly out of 
proportion to the value of the result. 
Many young trees, where skidding is going on, lose 
pieces of their bark by contact with the harness or the 
logs, and afterward become unsound. Young trees of 
merchantable species are commonly cut to build skid- 
ways when it would be almost as easy to take less 
