CHAPTER 18 



THE WAR AGAINST WOOD WASTE 

 A tree saved is a tree grown. CALVIN COOLIDGE. 



SINCE we have less than enough wood in the United States 

 to fulfill our present and future needs, we certainly have not 

 enough to waste. Nevertheless, we do waste quantities. We ac- 

 tually waste more of the wood that grows in the forest than 

 we use. Very little of the total contents of a forest goes into 

 finished lumber. 



This process of converting a forest into boards is essentially 

 a process of elimination and the actual amount that finally 

 becomes a finished product is a very small fraction of the 

 whole. In the average forest about ten per cent of the trees are 

 small and defective and these are not even cut. Fifteen per 

 cent more of the wood is left in the forest in the form of tops, 

 stumps, and brush. Ten per cent more is bark. The saw itself 

 eats up another ten per cent and turns it into sawdust. Nearly 

 twenty per cent more is removed in the form of slabs and 

 edgings when the boards are cut out of the log. Later still 

 some of the wood is wasted and lost in seasoning. Finally when 

 all these operations are completed, only thirty per cent, or a 

 little less than one-third of the wood in a normal forest has 



become lumber. 



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