46 CANADIAN FORESTRY ASSOCIATION. 



The department is continually holding up applications, where reports have shown 

 the lands are unfit for settlement. The licensees naturally protest against any such 

 incursion into their limits, and the department is left to adjudicate the matter, often 

 to the displeasure of the settler or the licensee. 



A common practice is to squat upon Crown lands, without application, clear a 

 small portion and erect a hut. In time, the department is forced, by some settling 

 conditions, to approve his application, although in many cases the location is made 

 among good timber. One can easily see the result. The cleared portion must be 

 burned and the surrounding forest is at once placed in jeopardy. 



The separation of purely agricultural lands from the lands only fit for timber 

 growth is to my mind, one of the greatest needs in our forests to-day. I have re- 

 ference to lands at present only in the vicinity of settlement. Such an undertaking 

 would, no doubt, involve a large expense. Only persons ' should be employed for this 

 work whose judgment could be relied upon as thoroughly competent in judging the 

 soils. Following this up with a corps of competent foresters for keeping down fires 

 and supervising the cutting is the first essential to the preservation of our forests. 



PRIVATE OWNERSHIP OP LANDS. 



Of the lands that have passed from the Crown, I will only deal with three of the 

 largest tracts. The grant to the New Brunswick Railway, for building a narrow 

 gauge railway from Fredericton to Edmunston, a distance of 167 miles, was 1,647,- 

 772 acres, and embraces lands princpally on waters tributary to the River St. John 

 and including parts of the counties of York, Carleton, Victoria and Madawaska. 



Mr. W. T. Whitehead, the company's agent, has this year, given me the follow- 

 ing estimate of the quantity of lumber on these lands : 



Spruce 3,014 million sup. feet. 



Fir 3,014 



Hardwood 4,743 



Cedar. . 406 " 



Total 11,177 



Of this large tract the company has sold only 600 acres. Fully one-third is 

 situate on the upper Silurian formation, representing some of the best settling lands 

 in the province, but the policy of the company is not to sell any for farming purposes, 

 and the progress of that section of the province is consequently retarded. 



It has been proposed that the government should buy back the settling portion 

 of these lands, which if accomplished at a reasonable price, would, in the opinion of 

 those who have studied the question, be productive of great results. 



The next largest ownership is that of the Alexander Gibson Company, who hold 

 the fee simple on upwards of 225,000 acres located principally on the Nashwaak river, 

 and absolutely controlling the lumber lands on that river. Mr. Gibson purchased the 

 greater part of these lands in the early sixties and has been cutting them ever since, 

 without a break. The growth is principally black spruce, which replenishes itself 

 about every ten years, in cutting down to merchantable logs. 



In a conversation I had with Mr. Gibson, some ten years ago, he estimated these 

 lands as worth to him twenty dollars per acre. It must be understood, however, that 

 any such high valuation can only be explained by the peculiar advantages possessed 

 by the owner. Over 1,000 millions of spruce have been cut on this property since Mr. 

 Gibson's purchase, and judging from reports, the lands to-day are fairly abundant 

 in timber. 



It may be mentioned here, that as much as 20,000 sup. ft. per acre of spruce has 

 been cut on choice bits of this property. In this connection, I may mention the cut 

 on a block of 3,000 acres I purchased on the Keswick river, in the year 1887, a tract 

 not particularly well timbered at the time, but fast growing black spruce. In -that 



