392 



Canadian Forcdry Journal, Oclobcr, 1919 



Of course, it would be expecting too much 

 to hope that such practices were only of the 

 past. Inherited tendencies die hard. The 

 iniquities of the fathers are often continued into 

 the third and fourth generation. But Dame 

 Nature has her own methods of making naughty 

 nations be good. The truth in the story of the 

 prodigal is as old as human history. Spend- 

 thrift nations, like spendthrift individuals, soon- 

 er or later come to the time when they must 

 face about, admit their errors and seek a fresh 

 start, or perish in their sins. In so far as the 

 gifts of nature are concerned this turning about 

 is synonymous with conservation, or working 

 for posterity. It is the antithesis of the policy 

 of charging the cost of the night's orgy to the 

 future. It is simply recognizing that everyone 

 must eventually pay in some form for his own 



fun. 



A Change is Coming. 



Fortunately, there are indications of just 

 such a change of heart in the treatment of cer- 

 tain natural resources in Canada. A generation 

 ago the vast spruce and balsam forests of East- 

 ern Canada were considered to be inexhaustible. 

 Because men wished to think so, it was the 

 common opinion that good-natured, generous 

 Nature would provide a new forest long before 

 all the virgin stand was converted into gold. 

 It was argued, therefore, that a very sizable 

 spruce could be grown in about thirty years 

 argo, natural rerpoduction would provide new 

 forests in plenty of time. No investigations had 

 been made of the growth of trees in Canadian 

 forests. Instead, the work on European forest 

 plantations which was not a parallel at all, as 

 well as forecasts of natural reproduction in the 

 Adirondacks, carried out by leading American 

 foresters were applied to Canadian conditions. 

 Time has shown that such applications were not 

 in any way justified and as if to make the error 

 still more glaring it is now known that the 

 Adirondack estimates of twenty years ago were, 

 like the report of Mark Twain's death, greatly 

 exaggerated. 



In addition, the appearance of hardwoods 

 on cut-over lands, the effects of plant diseases 

 and forest insects, and the awful wastage due 

 to forest fires were left out of the reckoning al- 

 together. The result is only an illustration of 

 the futility of guessing where accurate, pains- 

 taking research should have been applied. 

 Nature never unfolds her secrets to half-hearted, 

 dilettante students, or to the unobservant woods- 

 man. And so, although the day of Canada's 

 virgin forests is already far spent, definite 



action has at last been taken to carry out such 

 essential studies in pulpwood forests. Naturally 

 many years will be required to obtain conclusive 

 results, for trees are not products of a single 

 season. 



Pkivate Companies Take the Initiative. 



It is rather a striking circumstance that per- 

 haps the most comprehensive studies now being 

 undertaken in Canada are largely the result of 

 private initiative. Forestry, on account of its 

 long-time elements, has been viewed as being 

 properly a state activity. But the governments 

 concerned failed to take adequate action in 

 time. Hence such companies as the Laurentide 

 Company, the Riordon Pulp and Paper Com- 

 pany, and the Abitibi Power and Paper Com- 

 pany have commenced, in conjunction with the 

 Commission of Conservation, a series of such 

 studies on their pulpwood limits in Quebec and 

 Ontario. Mr. Ellwood Wilson, forester of the 

 Laurentide Company, and a close student of 

 European forestry methods, has been a prime 

 mover in this important work. Coincidentally, 

 a policy of reforestation has been adopted. 

 During the spring of this year the Laurentide 

 Company planted approximately 1 ,000,000 

 seedlings and the Riordon Company 750,000. 

 The greater proportion of these are Norway 

 spruce grown in American nurseries from seed 

 imported from northern Europe. The provin- 

 cial nursery at Berthierville also furnished large 

 numbers of these seedlings. It is unfortunate 

 that native spruce seedlings could not have been 

 obtained, for Norway spruce have never been 

 grown except as ornamental trees in Canada, 

 and their behaviour in forest stands is proble- 

 matical. Close comparison of conditions in the 

 natural habitat of the Norway spruce and those 

 in Quebec encourage the hope that the imported 

 seedlings will develop satisfactorily. A ready 

 market could be found at the nurseries for seeds 

 of the native spruces, but so far there has been 

 no attempt at collecting them m a large way. 

 Small areas of white and Scotch pine were also 

 planted on land where the soil conditions seemed 

 most favorable for their growth. The planting 

 was done in rows four or five feet each way, by 

 gangs of forty to fifty men with the same num- 

 ber of boys to "drop" the seedlings as the 

 holes were made. Such gangs planted from 

 25,000 to 30,000 seedlings each per day during 

 the short planting season in May. Judging 

 from the results obtained on small plots in 

 previous years, it is expected that from 75 per 

 cent to 90 per cent of the seedlings will grow. 



