THE policy of the Minnesota Forest Service is a construct- 

 ive one, and therefore in order to carry out this work 

 of construction it was necessary to erect, as it were, a 

 scaffolding from which the actual building could be per- 

 formed. With the fact in mind that there are approximately 

 15,000,000 acres of land in the state of Minnesota that can be 

 more profitably employed growing trees than for any other 

 purpose, you can get some idea of the magnitude of the task. 

 The object of our forest service is to secure to the commu- 

 nities and the state, both now and in the future, the greatest 

 returns from our forests. It is obvious that inasmuch as tree 

 growth is a comparatively slow process, so also must be the 

 constructive work of the service, that tends to preserve and 

 perpetuate tree growth. 



The work that the service has done and is doing is more or 

 less of a temporary nature. The scaffolding will be removed 

 when the building is completed. When looking at a fine struc- 

 ture we forget the scaffolding which was of such importance 

 during the constructive period. .And so it will be with our 

 forest work, the preliminary work will be forgotten, but on 

 its success and completeness will depend the safety of our 

 finished structure. In starting out to upbuild and maintain 

 our forests, it was first necessary that we should protect what 

 we already had, both merchantable timber and young growth. 

 The forest has one enemy which easily outdistances all others, 

 namely fire. The causes that produce fires may be natural 

 or artificial. Fires which originate from natural causes, such 

 as lightning, do not exceed two per cent of all the forest fires 

 occurring in this part of the country. For the remaining 98 

 per cent, attributable to artificial causes, man is more or less 

 directly responsible, either by carelessness or by accident. 



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