101 



CONCLUSION 



Until 75 years ago poor transportation facilities resulted in low wood- 

 land values in the heavily wooded areas, while in the prairie region these 

 values were as much as seven times those of prairie land. During the 

 past 75 years the development in transportation has enabled Illinois and 

 the nation at large to enjoy the products from the virgin forests of the 

 Lake States, of the South, and of the West. 



With the exhausting of the virgin forests the nation will be con- 

 fronted with much the same problem as confronted the pioneer prairie 

 farmer. The cut-over timber-lands will be called upon to meet the wood 

 requirements of the nation. Those annual requirements are now nearly 

 four times the average annual growth of all timber-land for the nation at 

 large, and ten times the average annual growth for Illinois. 



For the public this condition predicates a decided increase in the cost 

 of wood products, for the wood-using manufacturers a dislocation of in- 

 dustry and the use of substitutes where substitutes are economically pos- 

 sible, but for the wood-lot owner correspondingly greater returns from 

 the productive wood-lot. 



The process of forest destruction is far advanced in Illinois. First 

 growth or virgin timber has virtually disappeared, and the present drain 

 on the cut-over forests and second-growth stands, unchecked, will result in 

 an early disappearance of all forests in Illinois. 



There was an increase in unforested waste land of a quarter of 

 a million acres in the ten years from 1910 to 1920. and Illinois now has 

 a total of 1,577,663 acres in this class. The 3,021,650 acres now forested 

 are on lands unsuited to ordinary farming and if cleared will generally 

 revert to waste land. 



There is an urgent need for the educating of both the wood-lot owner 

 and the public on the measures required to protect the present forests, to 

 balance growth and cut and bring them to their fullest possible produc- 

 tion, and to reforest as much of the 1,577,663 acres now in waste land 

 as is economically justifiable, so that when the supplies of virgin timber 

 fail elsewhere, the farm wood-lots of the state shall provide for the needs 

 of the farm, and unproductive waste land be turned to profitable use. 



