Canadian Forestry Journal, March, 1919 



115 



years of seed production! It is probable that 

 the average spruce tree in the forest bears seed 

 for at least 100 years. 



How many bearing trees there are per acre 

 or square mile under average conditions and 

 how much seed they produce in a fruiting sea- 



son, we don't know. This is a very interesting, 

 not difficult, subject for investigation, and is of 

 direct economic importance. 



Thus far, however, no definite study of seed 

 production of spruce, or of any other com- 

 mercial timber tree, has been made in Canada. 



LUMBERMEN AND THE TREE SUPPLY 



By W. Gerard Porver. 



President of Canadian Lumbermen's Associa- 

 tion Champions Progressive Policy m 

 Forest Perpetuation. 



To ask a practical lumberman to speak on 

 Conservation is putting a difficult task indeed 

 before him. His every energy is as a rule bent 

 on felling more and more trees, on bringing 

 more and more logs to his mill, on sawing more 

 and more lumber, so that he may give satisfac- 

 tion to his employers and shareholders, and be 

 deemed a success in the opinion of his fellow- 

 members of the profession. 



His basic idea is the more production the more 

 dividends, the more dividends the more honor, 

 not to speak of material advantages. 



It is difficult indeed to blame him. In years 

 gone by when the trade was young in this 

 country, it was generally believed that our forest 

 supplies were illimitable and inexhaustible. The 

 idea that the day would ever come when the 

 United States would find itself with its stores 

 on the verge of exhaustion, and the words of a 

 celebrated British authority, Mr. M. C. Du- 

 chesne, F.S.S.. "Canada contains the only vast 

 resources of timber within the limits of the 

 British Empire," never entered the heads of these 

 pioneers who with their sturdy bushwackers 

 roamed the forests heedless of waste, and ex- 

 travagant in method, driven thereto by the one 

 principle, "To get the logs to the mill, and to 

 get the best." 



It is not for us in this generation to criticize 

 the methods of our forefathers, and to suggest 

 that their management of the woods was not on 

 the right lines, or their system of forestry un- 

 sound. 



The Debt to the Lumberman. 



Other times, other manners. Who in those 

 days could guess that Canada would one day 

 be called upon to supply timber to the entire 

 world, and, moreover, if the methods of the old 



times were not so scientific as ours, justice forces 

 us to admit but for them a great portion of the 

 country would still be undeveloped, roads un- 

 opened, and towns and villages as yet un- 

 founded. 



A number of the provinces without their activ- 

 ity and industry would have with great difficulty 

 found means of increasing year by year grants 

 for education, social wcrk, and general develop- 

 ment. (Since 1867 the Province of Quebec 

 has derived from the forests the sum of 

 $42,000,000.00). 



Millions of dollars spent in wages and con- 

 struction would never have been attracted to the 

 country, and further it is hardly likely that this 

 Canada of ours would have been so well known 

 to the world as it is to-day. 



So much for the past. The trade and its 

 members have been great factors in the up- 

 building of our nation, and we have reason to 

 be proud of it and grateful to them. 

 The Call of the Future. 



We must look at the present and to the 

 future. To-day the business of production of 

 wood material is the second greatest industry in 

 Canada. What will it b? to-morrow? We be- 

 long to an age of optimists, and though the 

 bloody carnage in Europe and its consequences 

 have necessarily oppressed us during the past 

 four years, now that the high sun of Victory 

 is shining in the Heavens and the Angel of 

 Peace has descended over the world, we feel 

 ourselves warmed and invigorated, ready to 

 face the future with hope and confidence. 



Every nation on earth freed from the horrid 

 nightmare which has oppressed it. is taking 

 stock and preparing to face the future. The 

 national resources are being carefullv invesli- 



