1480 A NATIONAL PLAN FOR AMERICAN FORESTRY 



grazing, or watershed protection. A large part of the forest acreage is 

 in public ownership and under sustained yield management, but 

 little intensive forestry is possible. 



Where there is a ready market in farming communities, as in the 

 ponderosa pine forests of the Black Hills of South Dakota, the planted 

 forests of the sand hills of Nebraska, or the lodgepole pine forest in 

 several localities in the Intermountain Region, notably in the Mini- 

 doka National Forest in southern Idaho, silvicultural practices are 

 gauged to give intensive utilization and high productivity for the sites 

 involved. In a few localities it has been possible to cut Christmas 

 trees as a thinning operation. 



PACIFIC COAST 



In California the redwood type offers excellent opportunity for 

 intensive forestry. Most of this type is in private ownership, is 

 highly productive, and in any State program for increasing forest 

 productivity merits early attention. Recent studies have indicated 

 that selective logging can be practiced here both with profit to the 

 owner and with assured prospects of continued productivity. If 

 clear cutting is practiced provision must be made either for leaving 

 adequate redwood seed trees or for planting up the vacant spaces 

 between the sprouting redwood stumps. Without either of these 

 measures, only a fraction of the potential yield will be realized. 

 Before the depression a beginning was made by some operators in 

 interplanting clear-cut areas with redwood. 



In this region also there is great need for improving utilization, 

 through the integration of industries and the manufacture of by- 

 products, in order that the present great waste in lumbering may be 

 avoided. Thinning of redwood sprouts and pole stands, and far 

 better fire control, must also be part of the program. 



In the sugar pine-ponderosa pine type the bulk of the commercial 

 timber area is on national forests. It is being cut on a small scale in 

 such a way as to assure continuous, though certainly not maximum, 

 production. Integration of industries and availability of markers 

 are not such as to permit complete utilization. The ravages of 

 insects and fire are not adequately controlled. Much ground is 

 occupied by low-grade or worthless white fir trees, which ought to 

 make room for trees of better species. The opportunity for intensive 

 forestry is obvious. On private land the great need is to stop de- 

 vastation. This can be done by logging selectively and by taking 

 more care to spare the advance reproduction. More intensive for- 

 estry is most likely to come about through increased public ownership. 



An interesting example of intensive forestry practice may be 

 observed on the Eldorado National Forest, Calif. Here dense 

 20- to 60-year-old thickets of white fir and California red fir were 

 thinned for Christmas trees on areas accessible to roads. The opera- 

 tion netted a material profit and the forest was left in a much better 

 condition for rapid growth. 



The Douglas-fir type of western Washington and western Oregon 

 offers excellent opportunity for intensive forestry, because the pro- 

 ductivity of the better lands is high and can be maintained at not 

 unreasonable cost. Here as elsewhere in the West, private timber 

 averages better in quality than national forest timber and therefore 



