284 The Farm Woodlot 



on the coast, and innumerable rivers of unheard-of size 

 stretched far inland to float the timber from the interior 

 down to the settlements on the coasts. 



Unfortunately for the conservation interests, about the 

 time that the depleting of the local supply on the coast 

 might have become apparent, the introduction of the 

 railroad and the improvement of inland waterways made 

 it possible to tap the vast resources of the lake region for 

 the benefit of the East. Thus the idea of an inexhaustible 

 supply, later to prove so dangerous, was given re- 

 newed strength. And so continuous and all-sufficient has 

 been the supply poured into the older and more thickly 

 settled sections from more and more distant forests that 

 people have been slow to learn how nearly the " inexhaust- 

 ible forests" have been exhausted. 



The once unbroken forests of the Northeast are now, 

 with the exception of certain parts of the mountainous 

 country, reduced to scattered remnants of culled-over 

 woodland incapable of supplying any considerable part of 

 the local demand. The vast forests of Michigan alone 

 were at one time considered sufficient to supply the world 

 forever. Yet so rapid has been our increase in population 

 and so unprecedented our development that those forests 

 have been practically wiped out, and Michigan is already 

 out of the race as a timber producer. Wisconsin and 

 Minnesota had the same fate, and now this whole great 

 nation, larger and more timber hungry than ever, has 

 only the West and the South to look to for her future sup- 

 ply. The timber of the Rocky Mountains is incon- 

 siderable when it comes to answering the demands of the 

 whole country and the possibilities of the South and West 



