110 THE SCHOOL BOOK OF FORESTRY 



Some method must be worked out of harness- 

 ing our idle forest lands and putting them to work 

 growing timber. Any regulations that are im- 

 posed on the private owners of woodlands must 

 be reasonable. Changes in our present methods 

 of taxing timberlands must be made to encourage 

 reforestation. The public must aid the private 

 individuals in fighting forest fires, the greatest 

 menace that modern forestry has to face. A 

 national policy is needed which will permit the 

 private owner to grow trees which will give him 

 fair and reasonable profit when sold. 



The farmers of this country use about one- 

 half of all the lumber consumed annually. They 

 own approximately 191,000,000 acres of timber 

 in their farm woodlots. If farmers would devote 

 a little time and labor to the permanent upkeep 

 and improvement of their timber, they would 

 aid in decreasing the danger of a future lumber 

 famine. If they would but keep track of the 

 acreage production of their woodlands as closely 

 as they do of their corn and wheat crops, Ameri- 

 can forestry would benefit greatly. 



Between 1908 and 1913, the U. S. Forest Ser- 

 vice established two forest experiment stations 

 in California and one each in Washington, Idaho, 



