84 ANNUAL REPORT OF 



ITALY. 



STATE FORESTS. 



It was a peculiar pleasure to receive, as I lately did, 

 from the Ministry of Agriculture at Rome, an account of 

 the forestry of Italy, that beautiful country which dates 

 back thousands of years and whose woods have been sung 

 by Horace and Virgil. The aggregate area of the state 

 forests is 128,960 acres, principally situated in Tuscany 

 provinces of Florence, Orezzo, Grosseto, Pisa and Leg- 

 horn; and Venice provinces of Belluno, Treviso and 

 Udine. These lands are regarded as inalienable. The 

 prevailing kinds of trees are oak, beech, pine, larch and 

 fir. The total annual expense of administration averages 

 about $80,000. The annual sale of the raw material from 

 the state forests averages 1150,000. The number of 

 acres annually reforested with trees is 1 50. The method 

 of reforesting varies according to the different species of 

 trees and the local conditions; but seeding, whether arti- 

 ficially or naturally, is used only for the oak and the 

 beech. For other kinds, such as the fir, pine, larch and 

 chestnut, reforesting is done by planting. Generally 

 good care is taken to maintain a sustained yield. In re- 

 gard to cutting, the practice is to cut only those trees 

 which have reached fiscal maturity and those that are 

 dead or about to die. 



The damage caused by forest fires amounts to about 

 $80,000 a year. The causes are principally accidental. 

 Only a very small number of forest fires are caused by 

 railway locomotives. The forest service has much im- 

 portance in the protection of mountainous land and in the 

 control of water. The annual salary of the chief in- 

 spector of the forests of the first class is 6,000 lire; that 

 of the chief inspector of forests of the second class, 5,000 

 lire; that of inspector of forests of first class, 4,000 lire. 



