FOREST ARBORETA 



33 



I hold no brief against the lumber- 

 men, they have been pioneers in in- 

 dustry. They have added greatly by 

 their initiative, their abilities, and their 

 remarkably skillful methods in turning 

 forests into lumber and lumber into 

 money, in the material development of 

 the United States. But in the woods 

 work they have done, their last thought 

 as a rule has been the safety and per- 

 petuation of the forest. Their first 

 thought has generally been to take the 

 cream, and to leave the skimmed milk 

 behind. 



What has been the result? The re- 

 sult has been to devastate some one 

 hundred million acres of forest land in 

 America. This land has been stripped 

 so clean by careless use of the axe and 

 the saw and the following fires, that 

 trees must be planted by hand upon this 

 vast area to bring back a commercial 

 forest upon it, and thus to restore it to 

 productive use. 



We do not need to go far from home 

 to see this waste. We have it at our 

 doors, right in the Adirondacks. Some 

 one has made the forceful state- 

 ment that forestry is practiced in the 

 Adirondacks everywhere except right 

 in the woods. I realize that here and 

 there Adirondack forest owners have 

 turned their thoughts to thrift. But on 

 the whole the Adirondack forests are 

 not being perpetuated or improved by 

 careful utilization but are being de- 

 stroyed by reckless use. 



Where is the remedy for this waste- 

 fulness? For this obliviousness to the 

 future? For this feverish appetite for 

 wood, about twenty times as great per 

 capita as that of the great nations of 

 Europe? Where lies the remedy for 

 this ? What shall I say for this some- 

 what perverted, artificially stimulated 

 appetite? What are the methods under 

 which our forests may be made not only 

 storehouses but factories of wood? 

 Three great forces must work together 

 to save our forests the nation, the 

 States and individual citizens. No one 

 force can in time accomplish adequate 

 results in forest conservation. 



In regard to tree planting, the United 

 States naturally falls into three regions 



the Eastern, the Central and the 

 Western. The Eastern region is that 

 one which lies east of the Great Prairie 

 States. In it is a vast aggregate of 

 denuded lands suitable only for forest 

 growth on which as the result of re- 

 peated fires following logging, natural 

 reproduction has not and probably will 

 not take place. Cut-over and burned- 

 over lands in urgent need of forest 

 planting in the Atlantic region, and in 

 the northern portion of the northern 

 States, alone aggregate over three and 

 one-half million acres. 



Then there is the great area of aban- 

 doned farm lands, mainly in New 

 England and in the southern moun- 

 tains ; and then again there are the 

 woodlots rendered unproductive by 

 misuse, on which planting is essential to 

 bring back the forest crop. 



The Central region comprises the 

 prairie country. Tree planting is 

 urgently needed there to protect crops 

 from wind, to grow timber for ordinary 

 farm purposes in a mainly treeless 

 country. In the far west the planting 

 problem is mainly federal and on it a 

 good beginning has been made. 



To sum up, gentlemen, without going 

 too deeply into the dry realms of figures 

 and statistics, we have planted in the 

 United States just about one acre in 

 every ten thousand acres which it is our 

 duty to ourselves and those who follow 

 us to plant forest trees. 



There is the task. Now, what is 

 needed for its accomplishment? As I 

 see it, these are the main things: A 

 much more wide and more definite 

 knowledge on the part of the land- 

 holding citizens of the returns and 

 profits who follow us to plant forest 

 trees. There is much need for that. 

 Mention tree planting to the average 

 man. What is his response ? " Plant 

 trees," he says, " Why, I can't wait that 

 long for my returns. Tree planting is 

 all very well for States and Govern- 

 ments, but I am merely a man with a 

 little span of life ahead of me. When 

 I invest I must at least live long enough 

 to harvest the crop." 



You see, gentlemen, that such men 

 are apt to think not in terms of white 



