Forests and Forestry 133 



the ordinary way of reproducing forests is to plant 

 trees. When they contemplate the immense extent 

 of forest area in the country and the outlay which 

 replanting even a moderate proportion of the de- 

 forested tracts would involve, the enormity of the 

 task appalls them. They flout the possibility of 

 such an enterprise, and in the belief that this is 

 what forestry reformers are advocating, set the 

 whole tribe down as impracticable visionaries. This 

 state of mind used to be more common than it is, 

 but it is still encountered far too often. Now the 

 fact is that the planting of nursery trees, or even 

 the seeding of trees in the places where they are to 

 remain, is but a last resort in forestry. It is not so 

 much that it will not pay. For under reasonably 

 favorable conditions the final harvest will yield 

 enough to net a profit even where the original out- 

 lay of planting has reached twelve or fifteen dollars 

 per acre, which ought to be considered the outside 

 limit of cost. Ordinarily it will be found much 

 lower, especially where the forester has his own 

 nursery, as he would in most cases. But the trou- 

 ble is in finding capital willing to be invested in an 

 enterprise that will not return it for so long a period 

 as is required to develop merchantable timber out 

 of seedlings. 



Fortunately, the planting of trees on entirely 

 denuded tracts is necessary in but few instances. 

 The greater portion of American woodlands is in 

 the condition of culled forests, that is, forests from 

 which the merchantable trees have been cut, leaving 



