28 THE DEVELOPMENT OF BRITISH FORESTRY 



years. Endres states that the yield in timber from the 

 Saxon State forests was 459,953 cubic metres in 1850, and 

 832,232 cubic metres in 1888, the increase in area during 

 that thirty-eight years being but 50,000 acres. As Mayr 

 also remarks,^ the annual yield of German forests has 

 increased from 10-20 to 40-50 cubic feet per acre, in 

 spite of the dangers from frost, wind, insects, and fungi 

 incidental to pure crops grown on the high forest system. 



An increase in yield, corresponding to that in Germany 

 from the whole of the European State forests alone, would 

 bring the production of timber to at least double that of 

 the present time, and would leave very few countries in a 

 position of dependence upon their neighbours, except for 

 timber which they could not produce at home, or for pulp 

 wood obtained from the natural forests of the north. 



No doubt a temporary shortage of timber is likely to 

 occur in some parts of Europe and America, but it need 

 not necessarily attain the dimensions of a famine, unless 

 economy and common-sense are alike ignored. The price 

 of timber is bound to rise, however, to a fairly high level, 

 and this alone will tend to greater economy in its use on 

 the one hand, and a greater tendency to increase the 

 cultivation of it on the other. This, however, is no good 

 reason for embarking upon reckless planting schemes on 

 land which can never be expected to produce more than 

 scrub or small timber, a class of produce least likely to 

 share in any rise in value in the future. 



1 Waldbau auf ncUiirgesetzlicher Grundlage. 



