ECONOMICAL TREE KILLING 



By LEWIS C. SWAIN 

 Associate Forester 



A GOOD WAY TO increase the value of forests is to make sure that the 

 promising trees have plenty of growing space. Almost everywhere there 

 are stands of young timber where owners could get much higher financial 

 returns later on by carrying out practical thinning operations now. 



Many otherwise valuable forests are crowded to the point of stagnation. 

 On the other hand there are stands of crooked, defective, ill-formed trees 

 with good ones scattered among them. It is common to see extensive areas 

 of low value hardwoods, such as red, black, and white oak, mixed with white 

 pine which is prevented from developing because of too much competition. 



Owners of timberland may be fully aware of these existing conditions 

 but hestitate to take action because of high immediate cost and low return 

 in salable products. 



Thinning is efficiently done with modern hand tools and light-weight 

 power equipment. Much progress has been made in this direction but still 

 the cost per acre is often so high as to limit the practice to fairly small areas. 



Thinning By Poisoning 



For more than 25 years scientists have been experimenting with chemicals 

 for the purpose of killing unwanted trees. Their efforts have met with con- 

 siderable success both in regard to the chemicals and methods. 



This soft maple has been girdled with an axe and brush-treated with liquid 



sodium arsenite. 



