MICHIGAN ROADS AND FORESTS 



11 



nursery beds, and many more will be lost in 

 nursery beds, and man ymore will be lost in 

 transplanting. If from a pcund of Western 

 yellow pine seed that contains 10,000 mdiv.dual 

 seeds 4,000 three-year-old transplants are 

 available for field planting the Department of 

 Agriculture has obtained satisfactory results. 

 There are no wtwenty-four national forest 

 nurseries with an annual productive capacity 

 of over 8.000.000 seedlings. But there are many 

 There are now twenty-four national forest 

 which are waiting to be restocked and some 

 quicker and cheaper method than the actual 

 planting of nursery grown trees is urgently 

 needed. Therefore the foresters are making 

 experiments on a large scale with different 

 methods of direct sowing and planting and 

 most of the seed gathered last year was ob- 

 tained for this use. 



Broadcasting has already been found to give 

 good results in some regions. It was first 

 tried in the Black Hills of South Dakota with 

 an encouraging outcome. To broadcast an 

 acre t.f land with yellow pine seed about eight 

 pounds of seed is used. One of the most for- 

 midable drawbacks of this method is the ex- 

 tent to which the seed may be consumed by 

 birds and rodents. If the season happens to 

 be one in which food fcr these animals is 

 scarce the loss is very heavy. The problem 

 of control of animal pests, such as field mice, 

 ground squirrels and gophers, which eat the 

 tree seeds, and also the further problem of 

 preventing the depredations of rabbits, which 

 are altogether too fond of the little trees them- 

 selves, whether nursery transplants or field 

 grown seedlings, is receiving the attention of 

 the biological survey experts of the Depart- 

 ment of Agriculture. 



In some localities the Department has had 

 to purchase seed, but most of that used is 

 gathered by Forest Service men themselves. 

 The cost of gathering has varied for the dif- 

 ferent regions from 3. r > cents to $1 a pound. 

 As a rule the seed is collected in the fall 

 months, when most conifers ripen their seed. 

 Parties of three or four men ordinarily work 

 together. Where lumbering is in progress the 

 collectors follow the sawyers and take the 

 cones directly from the felled trees. In stand- 

 ing timber the tasks is much mere arduous. 

 The men must often climb tall pines and pull 

 the cones from the branches as best they can. 

 Where these are on the extremities and be- 

 \niid the reach of the hand, pruning shears 

 are used. The cones are dropped to the 

 ground and then gathered into buckets and 

 transferred to sacks in which they are carried 

 to a central point for further treatment. 



The extraction of the seeds is tedious rather 

 than difficult. In some cases the cones are 

 spread out upon sheets in the sun, when after 

 a time they open and the seed drops out; in 

 other 'cases it is necessary to resort to arti- 

 ficial heat. This is applied by placing the 

 cones upon trays with screen bottoms and 

 raising the emperatre of the room to the 

 proper degree. The cones open, the winged 

 seeds fall out and the seed is separated finally 

 from wings and dirt by a fanning mill. A 

 unod many seeds have been removedjrom the 

 cone by hand, but this is a sore trial to the 

 fingers of the pickers and exceedingly slow 

 process. 



Osceola t wnship, Osceola county, has vot- 

 ed an i^-ue of $23,000 for good roads. That 

 the sentiment in the township i> overwhelm- 

 ingly in favor of good roads is evidenced by 

 the vote which was 268 in favor to 60 nays. 

 Thirty-t ne women voted. Charles A. Thomp- 

 son, Henry Reuffer and M. W. Charleton, of 

 Evart, have been invited to act in advisory 

 capacity in locating, planning and construct- 

 ing the contemplated work. 



The Osceola township (Osceola county) 

 board has determined to survey fifteen miles 

 of highways immediately, and to grade at 

 least two miles this fall. It is proposed to 

 grade the fifteen miles as fast as the same 

 can be done economically, and to finish same 

 as required by the specifications of the state 



Michigan Forestry Association 



HAS FOR ITS OBJECT 



The modification of our laws which will enable the holding and 

 reforesting of forest lands. 



The protection of forest property against fire and trespass. The 

 disposition and management of our state lands. 



Every citizen should be interested in this work and join the Asso- 

 ciation. Membership fee $1.00 per year, including yearly subscription 

 to Michigan Roads and Forests, the official organ of the Association. 



PROF. HUBERT ROTH, Secretary, 



Ann Arbor, Michigan 



highway department as fast as possible. The 

 first two miles to be graded will be on the 

 "swamp road" north from Beech's corners on 

 the Avomlale road. The post office address of 

 the clerk of the board is Evart. 



The State highway department has accepted 

 th etwo miles of road built by the Grand Trav- 

 erse County road commission in Garfield 

 township; one mile of road in East Bay town- 

 ship and one mile in Whitewater township. 

 The Whitewater road was built by Township 

 Highway Commissioner W. A. Worden. A 

 mile of r ad built by Blair township also pass- 

 ed muster. 



Deputy State Highway Commissioner F. F. 

 Rngers. who inspected the roads, says: "I am 

 much pleased with the work done in Grand 

 Traverse. The grading is well done and the 

 gravel used is of good quality. In fact, some 

 of it is extra good." 



"The people of the northern counties are 

 keeping up with the other counties in the 

 matter of good roads." continued Mr. Rogers. 

 "But, unless they build something permanent, 

 they will find themselves in the position of 

 some of the older counties, which for almost 

 half a century, have been putting money in 

 repairs on their highways only to find that 

 after all this work and expense, they have 

 nothing better than when they started. 



"By permanent, I mean a first class graded 

 and graveled or macadam road. If the grading 

 is done and done right once, it need never be 

 done again. Of course, in time, the top dress- 

 ing of a gravel road will wear out but to put 

 it into shape again is comparatively easy and 

 this even need not be done if repairs are kept 

 up. 



"The territory covered by the Western 

 Michigan Development bureau presents an in- 

 teresting study when viewed in light of the 

 good roads m vement. Out of the 11 'shore 

 enmities' eight are working under the county 

 n ad system and the second or inside tier of 

 counties is almost solidly lined up. Just to 

 the north, Antrim county, under the township 

 system, has been building mile after mile of 

 good roads until now the rewards received by 

 that county from the state amount to the tidy 

 figure of $5,000." 



ADIRONDACKS' FIRE PATROL. 



It was stated by a party of New York State 

 officials who have completed an investigation 

 of tin 1 lire patv.l system recently installed in 

 the Adirondacks by the State that a few weak 

 points i; 1 . the elaborate fire fighting service had 

 Been revealed, and -that they will have to be 

 remedied before the system is as effective as it 

 was designed to be. 



When there is a hazy atmospheric condition 

 it is impossible for the lookouts on the fire 



stations recently erected by the State at a 

 large cost to see any great distance. A fire 

 at Boot Bay Pond, started by lightning, ran 

 for many hours before it was discovered. Now 

 there is an agitation for fireboats on the larg- 

 er Adirondack lakes, equipped with powerful 

 engines and about 1,000 feet of hose. 



PATROL FOR OUR FORESTS. 



During July fires laid waste valuable tracts 

 of timber in various parts of the country, 

 Wisconsin, Minnesota, Michigan, California 

 and Idaho being heavy sufferers. To be sure, 

 current conditions were most favorable to con- 

 flagration, but there is annually recurring dam- 

 age of this sort and the life of our forests 

 what is left of themt is being sapped. There- 

 fore, it would appear reasonable and business- 

 like that an essential part of the great con- 

 servation program should concern the preven- 

 tion of fires, or their spread to serious propor- 

 tions. It is the expressed opinion of most 

 of the forestry experts that these fires could 

 be reduced to a minimum, if there were a 

 sufficient corps of forest rangers to patrol the 

 forests in an adequate fashion. Such a corps 

 is not in existence now. The ranger body is 

 larger than it has ever been before, but it is 

 not large enough. The federal and state gov- 

 ernments seem to have millions and millions 

 of dollars to spend for all sorts of governmen- 

 tal activities. And certainly the politicians 

 who manipulate these millions of dollars have 

 millions and millions of words on their 

 tongues' ends on the subject of conservation 

 and the necessity for its practice. Yet they 

 have failed to provid-e the money needed to 

 patrol the forests properly and have a suffici- 

 ent number of rangers within call so that any 

 fire, or most of them that might develop, could 

 be put out before it grew to disastrous size. 

 The employment of an adequate body of for- 

 est patrol would of course represent a large 

 outlay. But the value of the timber eliminat- 

 ing the element of human danger and human 

 suffering that would be saved every year 

 would pay the expenses of the system many 

 fold. 



TO SELL DEAD TIMBER. 



Land Commissioner Russell announces that 

 he is making arrangements to sell all the dead 

 and down timber on state lands, as directed 

 by the public domain commission, which the 

 commission believes will yield considerable 

 revenue for reforestation purposes, as well 

 as remove some of the danger of serious for- 

 est fires. Sales will be held at central points 

 near state lands and the timber sold for its 

 estimated value. This is the first time this 

 scheme has ever been tried in Michigan. 



