10 



MICHIGAN ROADS AND FORESTS. 



Michigan Forestry Association. 



The Michigan Forestry Association was organized in Grand Rapids August 30, 1905, having for its object the promotion of a rational system of 

 forestry in Michigan. The society is managed by the following roster of officers : President, John H. Bissell, of Detroit, Vice-President, C. S. Udell, 

 Grand Rapids; Secretary, Henry G. Stevens, Detroit; Treasurer, J. J. Hub bell, Manistee. Board of Directors, Mrs. Francis King, Alma; L. L. Hub- 

 bard, Houghton; S. M. Lemon, Grand Rapids; H. N. Loud, Au Sable; Thos. B. Wyman, Munising; Mrs. J. C. Sharp, Jackson; C. D. Lawton, Lawton- 



The State Forestry Commission Charles W. Garfield, Grand Rapids; Arthur Hill, Saginaw; William H. Rose, Lansing. 



REFORESTATION 



AND THE PRESS. 



State Forester Filibert S. Roth. 



The energetic, enthusiastic and intelligent 

 treatment of the subjects of Reforestation and 

 Foresty at the meeting of the Press Club at 

 Traverse City clearly proves that our editors 

 know what the people want and need and are 

 ready to put their shoulders to the wheel to 

 bring about any measure which promises real 

 and lasting progress. Michigan is to be con- 

 gratulated on this point. The discussion at 

 Traverse City brought out three points clearly 

 and all three of vital importance to forestry 

 and to the state. 



The first is the keen, intelligent, and prac- 

 tically universal interest in forestry in the 

 state as expressed by these representative 

 men. 



The second is the much-mooted policy of 

 public lands, or "What should we do with our 

 tax lands and state lands?" 



The third is the uncertainty as to just how 

 much good forestry can do and how far it 

 can do the good claimed for it. 



Allow me to say a word on the last two 

 points, for the first requires no comment it 

 is simply a matter of general rejoicing. 



What good can forestry do to the state, 

 and how soon will any of this good be "avail- 

 able"? Let us take first the farmer's woodlot. 

 There are about four million acres of these 

 small woods and they furnish about seven mil- 

 lion dollars' worth of stuff, per y.ear, or more 

 than all the orchards of the state put together. 

 That the woodlots lack care we all know. To 

 take better care of them is to practice forestry 

 and by doing so these woodlots can be made 

 to grow easily 50 to 100 per cent more timber 

 and thereby add several million dollars to the 

 income of the farmer. This is not, as many 

 men seem to think, a matter of long waiting; 

 it is one of doing and of immediate improve- 

 ment and results. 



Again take the case of our large woods in 

 the counties in northern Michigan. There are 

 probably about eight million acres of the wood 

 or an area equal to 20 of our ordinary coun- 

 ties. They are now handled about as follows: 

 The owner in Detroit, Cleveland, Chicago or 

 Saginaw holds them; pays his taxes, spends 

 not a cent to improve them or care for them. 

 Why should he? When he gets tired of over- 

 taxation without protection lie "puts in a 

 camp," the timber is cut and the land sold or 

 left to revert to the state for taxes; usually 

 the latter. If the State of Michigan will give 

 this owner a chance to practice forestry in- 

 stead of forcibly hindering him, there is no 

 doubt whatever that several million acres of 

 these woods will at once be worked ove.r into 

 real forest properties where some timber is 

 cut each year, and the whole area protected 

 and improved. The owner instead of taking 

 off the whole crop and putting his money into 

 property in some other state will harvest what 

 grows on the land and will spend a part of 

 his income in protecting and caring for his 

 property. This is forestry, and the good that 

 comes from this practice begins with the day 

 that the owner hires a ranger and some help 

 to care for and improve things. 



Again take the case of the waste lands. To- 

 day it would be sheer folly for any man to 

 throw away his money in planting an acre of 

 pine, when the local taxgatherer can charge 

 him any amount he sees fit. This is a sore 



point, but we may as well own up that men 

 have paid as high as $100 a year on every 

 $1.000 of property in more than one district in 

 Michigan. Quit confiscating people's property 

 under the guise of taxation, and there will be 

 millions invested in reforestation. This also 

 is forestry, and the benefit a hundred times 

 greater and more lasting to the locality, begins 

 with the day that the owner spends a dollar 

 for help to set out these trees and care for 

 them. 



Forestry is not a speculative "in the sweet 

 bye-and-bye" sort of thing; it is business, and 

 business from the word go. 



Now as to state lands and tax lands. The 

 state in 1875 had over nine million acres of 

 its lands in soak for taxes. Half of all the 

 lands of the north half of the state were in 

 this condition. In 1897 the state still held 

 about nine million acres, and it has held lands 

 in this form anywhere from five millions to 

 nine millions for all these 35 years past. The 

 state has spent millions in advertising and 

 clerk hire trying to get rid of them. The 

 state spent over $1,500,000 in this way during 

 the ten years ending 1905. And to what pur- 

 pose? It was and is today a mere pouring of 

 water into the proverbial rat-hole. Not an 

 acre of land was protected; the fires destroyed 

 millions of young trees every year and do so 

 right now. Suppose the state had not spent 

 one cent on these lands; it would have been 

 just as it is today. But suppose the state had 

 spent these millions of dollars in hiring men to 

 watch these lands and keep fire out of them. 

 Why, millions of small trees could have grown 

 into millions of useful trees; we would have 

 millions of feet of timber where we now have 

 sweet fern and waste. This would have been 

 FORESTY, and the GOOD of the work to 

 the town and county would have begun with 

 the very day when an industrious man would 

 have been hired to watch and care for the 

 land. In place of a lot of useless clerks, and 

 in place of paying out thousands for useless 

 advertisements that no one ever reads, the 

 money would have been paid to the local 

 people for useful wprk. 



Again take the state lands. During the last 

 few years the State Land Office sold over 

 HALF A MILLION" ACRES of lands belong- 

 ing to the people of Michigan for the pitiful 

 sum of about one dollar and twenty cents per 

 acre. In Wyoming, .Montana and Washington 

 the wide-awake farmers decided years ago 

 that their state lands, arid for the most part 

 and far from the people of our state as it was, 

 should be worth $10 per acre. And we here, 

 riglr, in the midst of the greatest markets and 

 the best of transportation, and with a rapidly 

 growing people right here in the state, throw 

 away our most important resource for a mess 

 of pottage. But even this is not all. It is 

 notorious that these lands are not bought for 

 settlement. They are bought, just as tax lands 

 are bought, for the few feet of timber that 

 they contain; this is "skinned'' off, the land is 

 burned over, and then it again reverts to the 

 state, for the people to spend more of their 

 money in selling it a second, third or fourth 

 time. 



This is the method lauded by some people 

 as the only feasible and practical one. Their 

 argument is: If the legislature should reserve 

 these lands, the next legislature might change 

 things. Logically this means: there is no use 

 building a capitol, a railway or any kind of 

 institution, or there is no use of enacting any 

 law, for the next legislature may repeal it. But 

 we do not work that way. Legislatures arc- 



not bound to any law, they are the incorporate 

 will of the people, but as such they are goini; 

 ahead, doing the things the people deem \\ise. 

 This means a policy; an understanding that 

 certain lines of governmental action are good 

 for the people. .And in this conviction, ba-cd 

 on experience or understanding, lies the safety 

 for the continuance of any policy and, in fact, 

 of the government itself. 



Let the state hold these lands at a reason- 

 able price, say $5 per acre (.or half what the 

 people of Montana charge for arid lands), and 

 let them be sold publicly and on application, 

 and only to actual settlers. Then let those 

 lands which are not bought lie "bunched" and 

 kept for the purpose of raising timber, and we 

 slia'l quit throwing away the property of the 

 people and encouraging further devastation 

 and desolation. 



And where we have wastes we shall have 

 forests, and where we have whole townships, 

 which have not even need for a road today, 

 we shall have townships with woodworking, 

 industries encouraging agriculture and labor 

 and investment. 



There is just one more point of interest 

 here. When some men go into any of our 

 northern districts and boom some enterprise 

 which brings (or more often seems to bring) 

 some improvement, everyone rejoices. Here is- 

 forestry, the only perfectly "sure crop" im- 

 provement; and yet when it is suggested to- 

 try this together with other means to get our 

 "wilderness" settled up and the millions of 

 acres of waste lands utilized, there goes up a 

 howl of objection. Why should this he? If, 

 as has "been suggested, 25 per cent of these 

 lands are agricultural, why not let the state 

 try to make a beginning on the other 75- 

 per cent? Why leave, millions of acres idle 

 and waste when we are today importing the 

 bulk of our furniture and finishing lumber? 

 And w'hy waste the state's money and lands, 

 and timber, when a mere holding will do away 

 with this waste and lead to an income and 

 tot improvement of the land? 



Editors Discuss Forestry. 



At a meeting of . the Northern Michigan- 

 Press Association the subject" of reforestatioit 

 was discussed at some length. A report on 

 the subject was made by Perry V. Powers. It 

 slated. am,ong other things, that the state al- 

 ready owns about 700,0():i acres of land and 

 there is in process of being- acquired by the 

 state two or three million acres more. The 

 question is, what is to become of the land- A 

 number o* people believe that it should be 

 held by the state and not sold for less than 

 $."> an acre, and that it should be reforested. 



The land was formerly sold for taxes, and 

 as the taxes kept piling up year by year the 

 cost became more than the land was worth 

 and the state had "clearing sales." selling the 

 land as low as 10 cents an acre, but the Su- 

 preme Court decided that it couldn't do that. 



Now the land is confiscated by the state 

 after five years, during which time it is con- 

 stantly being advertised and is advertised 

 again before it becomes state property. Then 

 it is sold to the highest bidder, and Mr. 

 Powers believes this is the best method. 



He gave as his reasons that while one legis- 

 lature could set aside a tract of land, the next 

 one can dispose of it as is seen tit and there- 

 fore there could be no permanent control. On; 

 the other hand, if all the state land in Grand 

 Traverse, Wexford and Kalkaska and other 

 counties was converted into a forest it would' 

 mean that there would be no roads built, no- 



