TIMBER FARMING. 571 



the railroad averages about twenty-nine cents. Usually the 

 price is about equally divided, paying respectively one-third 

 each for the timber, making, and hauling ; but more recently, 

 on account of timber becoming scarce, it sells on the stump for 

 twelve cents a tie. There is a great demand for all kinds of 

 lumber that can be obtained in the " big woods," including 

 elm, which is extensively used by the prairie farmers for fenc- 

 ing, and is considered better than pine for that purpose ; bass- 

 wood, which is used principally for building purposes , black 

 walnut, butternut, oak, and maple, which finds a ready market 

 at remunerative prices for manufacturing purposes. Usually 

 we chop clean, and after culling every thing that can be used for 

 the purposes above mentioned, the remainder is made into 

 cord- wood, and either sold on the ground or hauled to market 

 as may be chosen. Maple wood, dry, sells for from one dollar 

 and seventy-five cents to two dollars and twenty-five cents, on 

 the ground, and is eagerly sought for by the more wealthy 

 prairie farmers and business men in villages and large towns ; 

 about the same price is paid for hauling. Basswood is worth 

 from sevent3'^-five cents to one dollar on the ground, and from 

 one dollar and fifty cents to two dollars and fifty cents deliv- 

 ered, according to distance. Oak and elm wood bears the same 

 proportion to these prices as its value for fuel. For chopping, 

 maple costs seventy to seventy-five cents per cord ; bass and 

 mixed wood fifty to sixty cents. The number of cords per 

 acre is, on an average, forty, from ten to twenty of it being 

 maple. Taking the lowest estimate of cost for chopping and 

 maple wood, it will be seen that the maple timber 

 alone on the stump pays ten to twelve dollars an acre, 

 and the remainder of the wood as much more, leaving 

 out of account the mercantile timber, which with the 

 labor expended in getting it out, is worth nearly or quite 

 as much as the wood. The brush is all cut and piled as the 

 chopping proceeds, so that in the Spring it is easily cleared and 

 fitted for the plow. The first crop, being corn, needs but little 

 cultivation after the first plowing, and seldom fails of produc- 

 ing at least one hundred bushels of ears to the acre, which 



