524 



THE FORESTS OF THE UNITED STATES. 



SOUTHERN CENTRAL DIVISION. 



ALABAMA. 



The northern and northeastern portions of Alabama, embracing the foot-hills of the southern Alleghauy 

 mountains and the valley of the Tennessee river, are covered with a rich and varied forest growth of broad-leaved 

 trees, in which oaks, hickories, ashes, walnuts, and cherries abound. South of the Tennessee river the rolling 

 country is covered with oaks, through which belts of short-leaved pine occur. In Cherokee and Saint Clair. 

 counties isolated bodies of long-leaved pine appear, while- a narrow strip of the same species stretches nearly 

 across the state between the thirty-third and thirty-second degrees of north latitude. South of this central belt 

 the country is again covered with forests of hard woods, which farther south, in the rolling pine-hill region, are mixed 

 with a heavy growth of the long-leaved pine ; and this species occupies, or once occupied, almost exclusively, 

 outside of the numerous river bottoms, the sandy plain extending along the coast and reaching nearly 100 miles 

 inland from the shores of the Gulf. Great regions of swamp covered with heavy forests of cypress occur in the 

 southern part of the state, especially in the region watered by the lower Tombigbee and Alabama rivers. 



The forests of northern Alabama still contain great bodies of hard-wood timber, although the demands of the 

 rapidly-increasing iron industry located here have already stripped of their tree covering many of the low hills of 

 northeastern Alabama. The best pine has been gathered from Mobile and Baldwin counties, in the neighborhood 

 of Mobile bay, from the lines of railroads and the banks of streams heading in the southern part of the state and 

 flowing to the Gulf through western Florida. 



The pine forests of southern Alabama have long suffered from the reckless manufacture of naval stores. 



During the census year 569,160 acres of woodland were reported destroyed by fire, with an estimated loss of 

 $121,225. Of these fires the largest number were set to improve grazing, or by careless farmers and hunters. 



The manufacture of cooperage and wheel stock, furniture, and other articles of wood is still in its infancy in 

 Alabama and the other Gulf states. Snch industries, in view of the magnificent forests of hard wood covering- 

 great areas in this region and the rapid exhaustion of the best material in the north and west, must in the near 

 future lie largely transferred to the southern states. 



The cypress 'swamps adjacent to Mobile bay yield a large number of hand-split shingles and give employment 

 to many persons, principally blacks. 



The following estimate of the amount of pine standing in the state May 31, 1880, was prepared by Dr. Charles 

 Mohr, of Mobile, who carefully examined the whole pine region of the Gulf states : 



LONG-LEAVED PINE (Pinus paluatris). 



SHORT-LEAVED PINE (Pinus mitts). 



