A NATIONAL PLAN FOR AMERICAN FORESTRY 343 



terraces; cash crops corn, cotton, and tobacco have been grown 

 under clean tillage; and the organic content of the soil has been 

 steadily depleted. Tenancy has increased, in many counties up to 

 80 percent, and the irresponsible attitude of the typical tenant farmer 

 has accentuated these tendencies. Whitney, in his "Soils of the 

 United States", says of tenancy: "It is a general experience that 

 soils deteriorate under tenant farmers, who have little interest in the 

 welfare of the farm beyond the year of certain occupation and little 

 capital and insufficient stock to work with." 



Fairfield County, in the Santee River drainage of South Carolina, 

 is an example of the erosion situation in the piedmont. The soil 

 survey of this county in 1912 showed that 90,000 acres of land, largely 

 cultivated at one time, had been permanently ruined by erosion. The 

 whole area has been dissected by gullies, and bedrock is exposed in 

 thousands of places. The State Forester estimates that in each of the 

 adjoining counties from 10,000 to 30,000 acres have been similarly 

 injured. W. W. Ashe computed in 1908 that an average of more than 

 850 pounds of soil per acre were yearly washed from the watershed of 

 the Yadkin River above Salisbury, N.C. Of this more than 125 pounds 

 was humus, chiefly from farming soils, and the balance mineral soil. 



Erosion from cleared lands, continues at least for a period, when 

 the lands pass out of agricultural use. If the abandonment is perma- 

 nent, they become potential forest land, and their erosion is the 

 forester's problem. In the past two decades there has been a general 

 decline in rural population and an increase in land abandonment. 



Opinions differ as to how rapidly abandoned farm lands in the pied- 

 mont will revert to forest or other volunteer cover, and thereby be 

 preserved against further serious erosion. The county demonstra- 

 tion agent of Fairfield County, S.C., believes that 75 percent of the 

 gullied land in this county will restock naturally within 3 to 5 years. 

 On the other hand, the extension forester of North Carolina, who 

 estimates that for his State as a whole there are approximately 2 

 million acres of idle and submarginal cleared lands which should be 

 returned to forest, believes that only 50 percent of this will restock 

 naturally within 10 years. The other 50 percent, he asserts, will 

 require definite planting, and 25 percent, or 500,000 acres, will require 

 some mechanical assistance such as soil saving and brush dams, 

 plowing in of gullies, etc. 



Unquestionably such differences of opinion arise out of variations 

 in the condition throughout the very large territory involved. The 

 light-seeded loblolly and shortleaf pines characteristic of the region are 

 difficult to keep out of cleared land adjacent to mature stands, but a 

 few scattered trees along fence rows across large cleared areas cannot 

 be counted upon to seed the land promptly and effectively after 

 abandonment for cultivation. 



Poorly farmed land and abandoned farm land are the chief sufferers 

 from erosion on the piedmont plateau. A third class of land which is 

 subject to some degree of erosion is heavily cut and repeatedly burned 

 forest. Abused forest land is important because even on the piedmont 

 a considerable percentage of the land is in woods; only two counties 

 out of ah 1 those in the region have less than 20 percent of their area in 

 forest and only 24 show less than 40 percent of forest cover. Leaf 

 litter from several years' fall accumulates on forested ground. A 



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