180 



A NATIONAL PLAN FOR AMERICAN FORESTRY 



ticularly marked among the more valuable woods (table 2 and 

 fig. 5). Three of the most valuable hardwoods hickory, ash, and 

 yellow poplar together have an estimated stand of less than 15 

 billion. 



CORDWOOD 



The total volume of all classes of cordwood is estimated to be 2,382 

 million cords. This total includes trees too small for saw logs but large 

 enough for cordwood use, regardless of whether it is cut for cordwood 

 or held for saw timber. It is made up of (1) the material on the cord- 

 wood areas, estimated at 1,102 million cords, and (2) the material 

 below saw-timber size on saw-timber areas, estimated at 1,280 million 

 cords. The latter, in turn, is made up of 794 million cords of small 

 trees and 486 miUion cords of tops and limbs (tops only in softwoods) 

 of saw-timber trees. 



TABLE 3. Stand of cordwood on cordwood and saw-timber areas of the United 



States, by regions 



[In thousands of cords] 



Table 3 gives the regional estimates for softwoods and hardwoods 

 on cordwood and saw-timber areas. The volume on cordwood areas 

 is almost exactly divided between hardwoods and softwoods. Two 

 thirds of the total volume, including practicaUy all of the hard- 

 woods, is in the East, where are the vastly greater cordwood areas. 



In many instances cordwood stands may properly be handled on 

 short rotation, for such products as pulp wood, fence posts, fuel 

 wood, etc., or where some necessity enters in to make the cutting of 

 the young stand both desirable and profitable. On the whole, how- 

 ever, the primary function of the stands on cordwood areas should 

 be to serve as essential forest capital or growing stock, to be de- 

 veloped into saw timber rather than to be cut as cordwood. This 

 statement is predicated on the belief that, broadly speaking, and in 

 the light of present knowledge, the bulk of our forests should be 

 managed primarily to produce saw timber, both to obtain the greatest 

 return on the investment and at the same time to meet most ade- 

 quately future timber requirements. To accomplish this, however, 

 something better than the present average of nine cords per acre 

 should be present. The indication is that the majority of cordwood 

 areas are subnormally stocked and that they need building up if 

 the future forest is to be adequately productive. 



