822 A NATIONAL PLAN FOR AMERICAN FORESTRY 



them. The States have not succeeded in controlling the gypsy 

 moth; they have kept down its numbers, but now it threatens to 

 extend its range westward and southward. 



In Maine large areas of spruce and fir have been killed by the 

 spruce bud worm, and attacks of the birch leaf miner are reaching 

 alarming proportions. A well-balanced entomological staff in Maine 

 keeps in close touch with insect depredations through the forest fire 

 organization, conducts careful studies, and makes recommendations 

 for control. 



New Hampshire, Connecticut, and Ohio have made notable 

 progress in investigations of forest- tree insects. 



Laws of California, Massachusetts, New York, Oregon, and Ver- 

 mont make it possible to require owners of property infested with 

 insects to take measures necessary for their control; those of Maine 

 and New Hampshire permit enforcement of private control measures 

 for white-pine blister rust, while those of New York and Vermont 

 do the same for any injurious diseases of forest trees. 



REGULATORY REQUIREMENTS 



The State laws which impose restrictions upon private owners in 

 the United States are discussed in the section of this report entitled 

 Public Regulation of Private Forests. As is there shown, except in 

 Louisiana and New Hampshire State regulatory laws have not had 

 in view the requirement of practices of utilization designed to assure 

 the establishment of a new forest crop on the land cut over, but 

 have been limited to requirements relating to the control of fire, 

 insects, and disease. Of these the requirements designed to lessen 

 the fire danger are the most extensive and important at the present 

 time. 



It is true, of course, that protection from fire is essential to the 

 establishment of a satisfactory new growth, and that with adequate 

 protection after lumbering forest perpetuation will in many cases be 

 accomplished without the application of silvicultural practices in 

 cutting the old stand; but broadly speaking, the objective of State 

 requirements relating to compulsory patrol, slash disposal, snag 

 felling, and the like is to prevent the spread of fire to surrounding 

 property and to facilitate the task of fire suppression as a general 

 public undertaking, rather than to maintain in a productive condition 

 the particular piece of land in immediate question. Regarded from 

 this standpoint, regulatory requirements relating to fire control are 

 largely a form of State aid to enterprises of forestry, supplementing 

 and integrating with the aid extended through organized systems of 

 protection. 



Legal restrictions or regulations are one thing; their observance 

 and enforcement are another. The regulatory restrictions imposed 

 by State laws upon private owners of timberfand are in some cases 

 well observed and enforced, in a few practically inoperative, and in 

 others feebly or unevenly operative. Lack of observance by private 

 owners may be due to unfamiliarity with the laws, or to a lack of 

 respect for or belief in them, or to desire to escape expense. Their 

 enforcement by the States is not all that could be wished. Among the 

 reasons are the small number of men available for the work, the 

 extent and difficult character of the terrain which has to be covered, 



