Canadian Forestry Journal, March, iq2o 



127 



Wind and Fire Damage to Forests 



By FranJiJ. D. Barnjum, Annapolis Royal, N.S. 



Is There Any Net Increment in the Nation's Stand of limber? 

 Enormous Loss by "" Blow down " 



In considering the question of 

 growth in our natural, or. rather, un- 

 natural forests, as they exist on this 

 continent today, we have to figure 

 not on some individual stand or town- 

 shij). but on a state or the country as 

 a whole, and in cycles of 100 years. 

 as the average spruce tree as harvest- 

 ed will run but little short of the cen- 

 tury mark. I am perfectly willing to 

 acknowledge that there is a growth 

 to every living tree that has not pass- 

 ed maturity, has not blown down, or 

 has not l)een killed by fire or som'e 

 species of the hundred and one dif- 

 ferent bugs. I also admit that there 

 is a combined net growth in some 

 sections of a township and. in rare in- 

 stances, in possibly a whole township. 

 But to offset this growth, as there 

 must be a debit as well as a credit 

 side, we must charge ofif the wastage. 



We will take the State of Afaine for 

 one example, as it is the most im|)nrt- 

 ant wood-producing section in the 

 eastern United States. Now ,if you 

 will refer to the cruiser's map of al- 

 most any township, you will find a 

 dotted path, in many instances run- 

 ning clear across the township of 

 varying widths up to a mile or more, 

 marked with tlie significant and 

 familiar words "Blow-down" or 

 ^'Wind-fall," A\-hich means that the 

 timber in that designated section ha^ 

 been destroyed 1)y wind. 



The next most familiar word is 

 "Burn," and (|uite often there inav I)e 

 two or tlirt'c or niort' sections iif ;i 

 townshi]) lh;it ha\(' been l)urned. run- 

 niui'; in si/.e all the way from 50 ai-res 

 up to 4.000 or 5.000, .and in sonic cases, 

 half or lhree-c|uarters of the township, 

 to c'\en. in the case of the IMiramichi 

 fire w hich swept across INIaine. a burn- 

 ed area of more than three million 

 acres. T cm think of at least one tire 

 in Maine, which occurred alvnit i»)o^^. 



which burned 100,000 acres, while an- 

 other fire, ill 1909, in the same State, 

 burned over 45,000 acres, and these 

 are merely two examples. 



In addition to the large, well- 

 defined areas of fire and wind dectruc- 

 tion, there is a continual dropping by 

 wind of a tree here and a tree there. 

 This is going on all the time, and 

 when you realize that it is only neces- 

 sary to lose one tree per acre per 

 year, varying in size from 5 inches to 

 12 inches in diameter, according to 

 location and consequent rate of 

 growth, to wipe out the entire g'rowth 

 by this one source of loss alone, and 

 then when you add to this the heavy 

 losses from the large wind-falls, fire 

 and bugs, you do not have to stretch 

 the imagination very much to realize 

 that not only is your growth incre- 

 ment wiped out, but also quite a little 

 of your principal as well. For this 

 reason, the thought ui)permost in my 

 mind is to try to arrive at a figure 

 that will approximate what this net 

 loss really is. 



In British Columbia 665.000.000, 

 000 feet of timber ha\'e been burned, 

 and this amount \ery nearly ecpials 

 the total stand of saw timber remain- 

 ing in Canada today. 

 In Maine, in the gale of 1883. a bil- 

 lion feet of soft wood Avere blown 

 down, in acUlition to a \er\' large 

 .amount o\ hard wood, in the two 

 counties <.A Oxford and I'ranklin 

 alone .and tlie loss in the whole State 

 w.is inc;ilcuable. 1 know of one town- 

 shi]!, which I afterw;!r(N bought, 

 where one-third of the entire st;ind y^i 

 timber w.is destroxed in this same 

 J^ale. 



1 ha\ e in mind a windtall in W is- 

 consin. between Prentice Junction and 

 I.adysmith. that covers a strip five 

 miles wide and 50 miles long, where 

 the timber w.is laid as flat as if tra- 



