40 



Canadian Forestry Journal, January, 1920 



Europe and America is not over 50 per cent ef- 

 fective; that is, the average crop is not over 50 

 per cent of the full or perfect crop; but forestry 

 in Wurtemburg is better than 70 per cent ef- 

 fective to-day and is improving. The state for- 

 ests of Wurtemberg and Saxony, over a million 

 acres, have for years past made better than $5 

 net an acre a year and have paid higher taxes 

 than the farm. 



What these forests do for shop and factory, 

 for climate and water flow, for transportation 

 railway and highway — would easily be worth 

 $10 an acre a year. And this "secondary bene- 

 fit" the state gets, but a private owner does not, 

 and here again lies a peculiarity of the forest 

 as a crop. That the forest can use poorer 

 land, cold and frosty sites, wet ground; that 

 it keeps up and even improves the soil; that 

 timber in the lumber yards does not spoil like 

 potatoes, but seasons and improves; that it is 

 bulky and costs money to haul, all these things 

 are too well known to need mention. To some 

 of our railroad people it might be of interest 

 'to know that the forest beats the farm easily 

 four to one in freight requirements. 



AMERICA HAS ADVANCED. 



Forestry is an old business in Europe, it is 

 new with us. And yet, thanks to Fernow, Pin- 

 chot, Roosevelt and others, much has already 

 been accomplished. Forty years ago the word 

 "forestry" was not in the American dictionary; 

 there was no forester in the United States with 

 an acre of land to work or a log to sell; we 

 knew little about our forest trees or our forests. 



To-day the United States forester has juris- 

 diction over an area of forests more than four 

 times that of all the forests of the former Ger- 

 man Empire. He offers for sale timber by the 

 hundreds of million feet. He has built thou- 

 sands of miles of roads and trails and telephone 

 lines, and has developed the best protective 

 system to be found anywhere in the world, when 

 we take into consideration the meager means 

 allowed by Congress. 



The forests of the United States are now well 

 known as to location, area, kinds of trees and 

 condition. The foresters of the United States 

 have more rcclt forest studies and experiments 

 under way than France ever attempted and we 

 shall soon be in shape to tell a man what he can 

 do and what he can expect with any of over 

 thirty kinds of timber on different soils and 

 sites, north, south, east or west. 



But what is more important than all this is 

 the fact that the people of the United States are 



informed, that their mind is set on forestry, that 

 the legislatures of most of our timbered states 

 have taken hold of this problem and that for- 

 estry as a definite policy in Congress has come 

 to stay. 



Forestry is here, it has progressed, and pro- 

 gresses now faster than ever. The great na- 

 tional forests have proved their worth; the 

 states have made beginnings; we are now ready 

 to attempt the hardest and the most important 

 task, that of gettmg forestry not merely started 

 but going in all of our most important forests - 

 those in private ownership, the forests from 

 which comes over 80 per cent of our lumber 

 cut to-day. Until we have succeeded in put- 

 ting forestry there we cannot claim really to 

 have it in this country; and is no real assurance 

 of our future supplies and the safety of our 

 industries and welfare. 



THE JOB AHEAD. 



The ]ob ahead is to prepare for a "growing 

 stock" of timber large enough to supply our 

 people with a yearly cut of at least 40,000,- 

 000,000 feet or 200 feet b.m. of lumber per 

 capita for a population of 200,000,000, and do 

 this in about 60 or at most 100 years. Ac- 

 cording to Endres, the German forests in 1900 

 furnished a cut of about 700 million cubic feet 

 of timber. Allowing as they do for one-third 

 waste, this means about 5.6 billion feet b.m. 

 saw stuff. This was grown on about 35 million 

 acres of woods, so that the yearly growth and 

 cut of saw stuff averaged about 160 feet b.m. 

 an acre. 



On this basis we would need 250,000,000 

 acres of productive forests growing 160 feet b.m. 

 an acre a year, or about 200 million acres out- 

 side of the present national forests. We shall 

 need more, for it takes time to learn the busi- 

 ness to start real timber crops and avoid large 

 losses. 



The task is here; it looms clear and is well 

 recognized. Interested and thinking men in 

 many walks of life are earnestly discussing the 

 subject. Forty years ago when Fernow started 

 our people in a campaign for real forestry the 

 general application of forestry was out of the 

 question. He knew this. To-day we are ready 

 for it and need it. We can see that without the 

 help of bulletins. Cypress plank in Michigan 

 at $130 a thousand feet; Pacific coast lumber 

 in Ohio and the east; dozens of sawmill towns 

 in desolate ruins; miles of railways abandoned; 

 the lumbermen's statement "the big mills of the 



