24 The Farm Woodlot 



care nothing for young growth and have no conception of 

 the land ever being able to produce valuable timber again. 

 To them the forest is a mine, not a growing crop. 



None of these men has ever cleared any land, and he 

 has no idea of what it means to clean up a hundred and 

 sixty acres of stump land so that it can be cultivated. 



The wrong way 



Without any definite plans, or any estimate of costs, 

 persons pick out the place that seems the easiest to clear 

 and build a small shack in the middle of it, absolutely 

 regardless of the character of the soil. Most of them know 

 very little of farming. They have never actually figured 

 on the results they expect to attain, and have an indefinite 

 idea that they are going to clear the whole farm in two 

 years. They have a still hazier, but more strongly rooted, 

 idea that the more often a piece of land is burned over, the 

 easier it is to clear. 



Under these conditions it is natural that they should 

 not only take no precautions against fire, but should even 

 use every effort to have the land burned over as often as 

 possible. In a very few years every growing thing on the 

 farm is destroyed except the almost indestructible and 

 rapidly growing brush. The land is reduced to a tangle of 

 worthless "bush," and all tree seed and tree seedlings 

 have been destroyed. The density of the brush soon 

 makes the volunteer growth of trees impossible and even 

 successful planting very difficult and expensive. 



Less than an acre is the average area cleared the first 

 year, and the man who has ten acres of cultivated land at 

 the end of five years is the energetic exception. He has 



