211 



PLANTING A SMALL SOUTHERN WOODLAND 



W. R. HINE 



The man who wants to plant a small 

 woodland in the South should first 

 make up his mind on several points. 

 Growing timber is a long-time project. 

 It requires good judgment in weighing 

 the several factors. It requires careful 

 long-range planning and a disposition 

 to abide by decisions made. It is well to 

 reach sound conclusions at the start. 



Wise land management dictates that 

 each field should be devoted to the pur- 

 pose for which it is best suited. Land 

 suited to the production of food crops 

 normally should be used for such crops. 

 Similarly, pasture land should be de- 

 voted to growing livestock, and land 

 that is better suited to growing trees, 

 including worn-out and eroded land, 

 might properly be devoted to growing 

 a timber crop. 



Common sense suggests that plant- 

 ing be done only on land that will not 

 restock satisfactorily within a reason- 

 able time. Many forest acres, though 

 bare of seed trees, will reseed naturally 

 from the surrounding woods, and the 

 young trees will grow if protected from 

 fire, trampling, or grazing as may be 

 necessary. A good stand of loblolly pine, 

 for example, will adequately reseed the 

 surrounding area to a distance of 400 

 feet or more. Many landowners have 

 planted, only to find in 3 to 5 years that 

 seedlings from nearby trees restocked 

 the area, rendering planting unneces- 

 sary. 



Potential forest land that is not re- 

 stocking to trees adequately or in a 

 reasonable length of time should be 

 planted. Adequate stocking means at 

 least 500 commercially valuable seed- 

 lings, fairly well distributed per acre. 

 Young trees in stands with fewer than 

 500 an acre at the start often grow up 

 excessively limby and produce only 

 low-grade products. Poorly stocked 

 stands grow less volume for a given 

 area than well-stocked stands. A rea- 

 sonable length of time to wait for 



natural reseeding depends on the cost 

 of planting and the value of the an- 

 nual growth of forest products. If, for 

 example, it costs $8 to plant an acre 

 of loblolly pine, which will grow at the 

 rate of 1 % cords an acre a year, worth, 

 say, $3 a cord, then an owner would be 

 better off financially if he planted in 

 preference to waiting more than 3 years 

 for nature to reseed. 



An owner will want to consider what 

 kind of trees to plant and this involves 

 a number of factors. A point of first 

 importance will be the market value of 

 products grown. 



While nearly any sound tree of good 

 form is marketable when timber is in 

 urgent demand, some species are diffi- 

 cult to market when demand falls off. 

 Pines are generally in demand. They 

 are closely utilized, bring good prices, 

 and grow more volume per acre than 

 hardwoods. Slash pine and longleaf 

 pine, in addition to their general use- 

 fulness for wood products, also pro- 

 duce turpentine and rosin. Hardwoods 

 present more of a marketing problem. 

 They are more limited in their useful- 

 ness and hence may not sell so readily. 

 Some species, as the hickories, are often 

 difficult to market. An occasional spe- 

 cies, such as blackjack oak, is seldom 

 marketable at all. This difference in 

 utility is the basis for one of the South' s 

 most difficult forest-management prob- 

 lems. Everywhere pines are cut heavily, 

 and the less productive, less valuable 

 hardwoods are left in possession of the 

 soil. Most planters prefer pine or other 

 softwoods. 



Some owners may plant for a special 

 product, as fence posts. For that pur- 

 pose they want such durable species 

 as black locust, or redcedar, Osage- 

 orange, or catalpa. 



The ability of a species to ward off 

 the hazards of a locality is a point for 

 consideration in selection. Fire has 

 been the scourge of southern forests. 



