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THE JOB OF PLANTING TREES: A SURVEY 



PHILIP C. WAKELEY, G. WILLARD JONES 



The planting of forests has been go- 

 ing on for a long time in Europe, India, 

 South Africa, Australia, and New Zea- 

 land. In the United States, the first few 

 scattered plantations were started 60 to 

 70 years ago in New England, New 

 York, and Pennsylvania. The first large 

 plantings date from about 1900, but 

 for a generation thereafter planting 

 went slowly. By the end of 1934, the 

 total planted area was only about 2 l /$ 

 million acres. 



The establishment of the Tennessee 

 Valley Authority, the Prairie States 

 Forestry Project, and the Soil Conser- 

 vation Service and the expansion of 

 the national forest and State nursery 

 and planting programs extended public 

 and farm planting from 1935 on, ex- 

 cept during the war years. 



By the end of 1948, nearly 5 million 

 acres had been planted successfully in 

 the United States 46 percent of it by 

 farmers and private landowners, 7 per- 

 cent by industrial organizations, 19 

 percent by States, counties, and mu- 

 nicipalities, and 28 percent by Federal 

 agencies. Planting has been most exten- 

 sive in the Lake States, the South, 

 New York, Nebraska, Pennsylvania, 

 Iowa, and Kansas. Only Rhode Is- 

 land, Delaware, Arizona, Nevada, and 

 Wyoming which are either small or 

 relatively dry-climate States report 

 fewer than 10,000 acres each as suc- 

 cessfully planted. In 1948 the demand 

 on State and industrial nurseries ex- 

 ceeded all records. 



Many individuals have been work- 

 ing on seed, nursery, and planting 

 problems: T. E. Maki, a forester, per- 

 fected a method of testing pine cones 

 for ripeness by floating them in oil, thus 

 saving thousands of dollars formerly 

 wasted on immature cones. Raymond 

 G. Rietz, a heating engineer, designed 

 cone-drying kilns and worked out safe 

 kiln schedules for extracting pine seed 

 from the cones. Lela V. Barton, a 



botanist, made important discoveries 

 having to do with storing tree seed and 

 increasing and speeding up its germi- 

 nation in the nursery. S. A. Wilde, a 

 soil scientist, developed special fer- 

 tilizer and compost treatments for for- 

 est nurseries in the Lake States. Carl 

 Hartley, a forest pathologist, developed 

 methods for preventing nursery seed- 

 lings from damping-off. Joseph H. 

 Stoeckeler, E. J. Eliason, and Floyd 

 M. Cossitt, foresters, evolved a highly 

 economical way to weed seedbeds of 

 pine by spraying them with dry-clean- 

 ing fluid. 



The planting bar most widely used 

 in the South was designed by three for- 

 esters, a ranger, a tool-company offi- 

 cial, and a boy in the Civilian Con- 

 servation Corps. Professional foresters, 

 implement manufacturers, and State 

 forestry and pulp-company technicians 

 have developed practicable tree-plant- 

 ing machines. Hundreds of others also 

 have made contributions. 



The techniques of planting are still 

 advancing rapidly. Today persons who 

 want to grow trees have a better chance 

 of success than ever before. 



Successful planting depends on 

 sound information, good judgment, 

 and careful work. Indeed, a conspicu- 

 ous aspect of planting in America has 

 been the outstanding success of many 

 beginners who have observed local 

 conditions carefully, compared in- 

 formation and suggestions from sev- 

 eral sources, and intelligently chosen 

 methods to fit their particular needs. 



A FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLE is that, 



on any given site, native species do 

 better than those brought in from an- 

 other country or region. When species 

 are planted out of their natural range, 

 they are more susceptible to disease, 

 insects, and damage from frost and ice 

 than are native species. Douglas-fir, 

 when planted in northwestern Oregon 



