ESTIMATE BY AVERAGE YEARLY GROWTH IOI 



e. Young Stands in Wild Woods. 



In the more remote districts of the United States the value of 

 the land, and the value of young, or non-merchantable timber is de- 

 batable. The determination of the cost of production of such a 

 stand, with calculations of compound interest, rent, charge of pro- 

 tection, etc., is not well understood, and not well received, and the 

 same is even more true with regard to the expectation value. 



For such cases it has been suggested to use a method strongly 

 advocated for years by Frey in Germany (See Zeitschirft fur F. 

 and J., 1915, p. 284), and employ the sale value exclusively as the 

 basis of estimate. Ordinarily this would work out about as follows : 



The ripe stand, 120 years old, is worth $300. A stand 40 years 



300X40 



old is worth . Generally, then, the value of any stand is 



120 



based on the average yearly growth in value, in the above case: 



300 

 = $2.50 per acre and year. Due allowance is made for de- 



120 



gree of stocking or condition of the stand. 



The advantage of this method lies in its simplicity; it expects 

 the trespasser to pay only for the wood actually on the ground and 

 destroyed. For stands older than one-half the rotation this method 

 is satisfactory; for young stands it does not quite do justice to the 

 owner. Thus if a plantation is destroyed 4 years after being estab- 

 lished the $2.50 per acre and year (in above case) would hardly clean 

 the ground and replant, and the owner would have nothing for the 

 four years' growth and expenses. To charge the cost of planting 

 and protection, etc., to the $10.00 actual value per acre, in this case, 

 is really to ask pay for the stand twice, once, its actual value, and 

 once on basis of cost of production, or at least a large part of this. 



Where natural reproduction is assumed to require 10-20 years 

 time, this period of reproduction is made part of the rotation ; i. e., 

 the rotation includes the entire time from one harvest to the next. 

 For the above case the crop worth $300 is produced in 120 years. 

 If an additional 16 years is required for natural reproduction the 



300 



average yearly growth is : = $2.20 per acre and year. In 



120 -|- 16 



the usual case of natural reproduction a stand of trees with an aver- 

 age of 20 years may contain trees from about 12 to 28 years old; 



