period of operation would be 10 years at the present 

 rate. As the mills exhaust their supplies, however, 

 the rate of cutting will diminish. 



Condition of the remaining supplies. The stands 

 considered above are those which are being or could 

 be logged on a large scale to large mills mills of 10 

 million board feet or more annual capacity. Such 

 mills now supply about 90 per cent of the timber 

 produced in the Lake States. Their holdings, even 

 though culled, are almost wholly of old- growth tim- 

 ber of superior quality as compared with second 

 growth. 



These concentrated commercial stands, aggregating 

 about 63 billion b:ard feet, contain about 57 per cent 

 of the total stand of timber in the Lake States, 

 which amounts to probably 110 billion board feet. 

 Of this total about 30 per cent (33y 2 billion feet) is 

 widely scattered in farm wood lots, while 13 per cent 

 (about 14 1-4 billion feet) is in the swamps, jack 

 pine and scrub hardwood plains, aspen and birch 

 stands, and cut-over lands in the North. The timber 

 in these stands is far below that of the commercial 

 stands in quality. The greater part is second growth. 

 It is smaller, more limby, and much of it has been 

 badly damaged by fire. Furthermore, it is largely 

 in small, scattered tracts unsuited for efficient large- 

 scale operations. In addition, about 19 million acres 

 bear a cordwood stand of about 113 million cords 

 below saw-timber size. If the lumber stand also is 

 reduced to cords, the total stand in the Lake States 

 is 630 million cords, or 50,584 million cubic feet. 



16 



