The Work of a Forest Engineer 



59 



Forestry Schools. 

 The recognition of this fact has led to 

 the establishment of a number of forestry 

 schools at leading educational centres on 

 this continent. In Canada alone we now 

 have three such schools. In October, 1907, 

 the Faculty of Forestry in the Uni- 

 versity of Toronto was established with 

 two instructors in forestry and eight stu- 

 dents. The number of students is now 47 

 and the teaching staff in forestry subjects 

 has been increased to four. In the Uni- 

 versity of New Brunswick, a Department 

 of Forestry was established in October, 

 1908 with one professor and ten students, 

 and at Laval University, Quebec, a Depart- 

 ment of Forestry was established in 1910 

 with two professors and fifteen students. 



Preliminary Training. 



The preliminary training for this pro- 

 fession consists of a four year undergrad- 

 uate course, supplemented with consider- 

 able practical experience in the field. A 

 brief outline of the course at the Univers- 

 ity of Toronto may be of interest. The 

 first two years work are mainly along the 

 line of an Arts course with Science Op- 

 tions, the last two years being almost en- 

 tirely devoted to technical forestry sub- 

 jects. There is also a six year combina- 

 tion course, whereby a man gets both his 

 Arts and his Forestry degree. There are 

 now six students taking this course, and it 

 is expected that the proportion of men 

 taking it will increase as time goes on. 



In what may be described as the tech- 

 nical part of the regular four-year under- 

 graduate and the six-year combination 

 courses, the students get a thorough drill 

 in elementary phanerogamic and crypto- 

 gamic botany, vegetable physiology, phys- 

 ics, chemistry, mineralogy, geology and 

 soil physics. More specialized courses are 

 given in forest botany, biological dendro- 

 logy, economic forest entomology, and the 

 fungus diseases of trees. The synoptical 

 course takes a general survey of the whole 

 field of forestry science; after which for- 

 est geography and the history of forestry 

 are dealt with for the express purpose of 

 letting the men know what is going on in 

 different parts of the forestry world and 

 enlarging their outlook. 



Then comes a very complete course in 

 silviculture, or the art of growing wood 

 crops to the best advantage; followed by 

 briefer courses in forest protection, forest 

 surveying, forest mensuration, forest val- 

 uation, forest utilization, timber physics 

 and wood technology, forest regulation, 

 forest finance, forest management and the 

 preparation of working plans. 



Some of the special lecture courses are 

 on prairie planting and farm forestry, the 

 administration of Canadian timber limits, 

 business methods of the lumber trade, for- 



est law, wood preservation, fish culture 

 and game preservation. 



From this outline of his academic train- 

 ing, it is evident that the young man who 

 completes his course will have a pretty clear 

 view of the whole field of forestry science. 



As regards the field training, there is 

 only one way to acquire, it, namely, by 

 experience in the woods. No amount of 

 reading or theorizing will give this ex- 

 perience. It must be learned at first hand, 

 but there can be scarcely any doubt that 

 the men who go into the woods with the 

 broad general outlook that a thorough 



MR. A. H. D. ROSS, M.F. 



academic training gives them will acquire 

 this kind of knowledge very quickly, and, 

 what is of more importance, know how to 

 apply it in cases where men without sim- 

 ilar training would utterly fail, and thus 

 prove themselves thoroughly unpractical. 

 Before being granted the degree of For- 

 est Engineer, candidates must give at least 

 three years' satisfactory service in the 

 field and present a thesis upon some 

 practical subject prescribed by the Faculty. 



The Forest Engineer's Problems. 



It will therefore be in order for us to 

 examine some of the problems that con- 

 stantly present themselves to the men in 

 the field, and how they grapple with them. 



In a young and undeveloped country 

 like this, a considerable portion of the 

 forester's time is taken up with surveying 

 and mapping. At times a rough recon- 

 naissance survey is all that is needed. At 

 others it is necessary to make a topo;zra- 

 phic map of the region, showing by what 

 routes the timber can be most easily re- 

 moved. If the property is to be placed 

 under permanent management, it will b« 

 necessary to make a complete forest sur- 

 vey of it. This will include (1) A more 

 or less accurate plane and topographic 

 survey, (2) An estimate of the amount 



