956 A NATIONAL PLAN FOR AMERICAN FORESTRY 



The rate of diameter growth assumed is .31 inch per annum, which \vas the 

 rate found generally on the better sites throughout Bradford County. This is 

 conservative, as no increase is made on account of the improved growth conditions 

 to be expected under management. 



The forest is managed on a 48-year rotation, with a turpentine cycle of 8 years. 

 The forest stand is thinned at the beginning of each 8-year period; the young 

 stuff, 3 inches and under in diameter, standing as it does in thick clumps scattered 

 over the area in the openings left by the removal, in previous operations, of the 

 larger worked-out saw-timber trees, is thinned to an average stand of 80 trees 

 per acre. At the beginning of management and in the eighth year this is the 

 only thinning necessary, but in the sixteenth year and every eighth year thereafter 

 the 8- and 9-inch trees, in addition, are thinned to 25 trees per acre. Before the 

 trees to be removed are cut, they are worked for turpentine for 8 years. At the 

 beginning of each 8-year cycle, the trees that have reached 9 inches diameter 

 breast high are worked for turpentine under a conservative long-time method by 

 which only one face is worked at a time. The first face is worked 7 years at the 

 rate of 12 inches in height per season, after a rest period of a year the second face 

 is started and carried for 7 years, there is another rest of one year, and the final 

 face is placed and worked for 7 years. Then the tree is felled for saw timber. 

 The opening resulting from the felling will restock naturally to slash pine seedlings. 

 The first thinning, when the trees are between 6 and 12 years of age, costs 50 cents 

 per acre, with no income; the thinning after turpentining in the 8-inch class pays 

 for itself through the production of one cord of pulpwood per acre. The final 

 cut is expressed in board feet, Doyle scale, with full deduction for cull caused by 

 turpentining. 



Fire protection is intensive, involving lookout towers, firebreaks, and organized 

 personnel with equipment. It is assumed to be adequate to the extent of keeping 

 at least 97 percent of the area free from uncontrolled fires, except for one serious 

 conflagration such as may be expected in the pine belt on an average of once in 

 50 years. Losses due to this fire are included in the calculations of yield as run- 

 ning on from the middle of the rotation. Normal mortality throughout the 

 rotation has been taken into account, in addition. Costs and returns for a 100,000 

 acre unit are shown below: 

 Average costs per acre per year : 



Protection and supervision $0. 1 4 



Taxes . 20 



Thinnings (every 8 years, at 50 cents) .06 



Total . 40 



Average returns per acre per year: 



Naval stores rental from trees cut in thinning 2 cents per cup .41 



Naval stores rental from trees of place, 4 cents per cup until trees 



become uniformly well spaced, then 5 cents per cup 2. 54 



Saw-timber stumpage . 48 



Total . 3. 43 



Net annual returns per acre (average over a period of 48 years) 3. 03 



The management outline given here is applicable to perhaps as much as 2 million 

 acres of the better forest lands in the longleaf-slash pine type in north Florida and 

 southeast Georgia, and elsewhere in the belt where forest conditions are similar 



In bottom-land hardwoods the chief management problem, due in 

 considerable degree to careless management in the past, is how to 

 eliminate the large percentage of defective growing stock. There is 

 an opportunity also to improve the composition of the stand. These 

 measures can be put into effect only gradually, as outlets are found 

 for the lower-grade material. 



It is believed that even this partial consideration of facts bearing 

 on private forestry in the South fully warrants the conclusion that 

 the time has arrived to apply organized management to the forests 

 still in condition to provide adequate yields. These facts definitely 

 show that without aid nature cannot continue to provide the great 

 volumes of forest raw material which have supported much southern 

 labor and provided an investment field for much capital during the 

 past half century. 



