CONCLUSIONS. 49 



the growing of timber on the sand hills, both for minor and major 

 products, may be on a perfectly safe financial basis and may be put- 

 ting the land to a considerably higher use than for grazing. 



CONCLUSIONS. 



In summing up the sand-hill planting it may be said that the 85 

 or 90 per cent of success attained in 1911, as compared with 5 or 10 

 per cent in the first planting, is due largely to improved methods in 

 the nursery. Seedlings pulled in the forest should never be used in 

 an arid climate, and even those which have been grown in near-by 

 nurseries may not be sturdy enough to survive unless they have been 

 once transplanted. 



The inauguration of transplanting has had as much to do with 

 progress as anything else. Sturdier trees are now being grown as 

 the result of the generous use of organic fertilizers and the applica- 

 tion of plenty of water to the seedling and transplant beds at the 

 right time. Reduction in the amount of shading has also prepared 

 the trees more fully for the sand-hill conditions. 



Undoubtedly some of the first planting by the slit method did not 

 sufficiently take into account the struggle which the trees would have 

 for moisture. The improved results to-day, however, can not in any 

 large measure be ascribed to new methods of planting, since the best 

 results ever attained on a large scale have foUowed the use of the 

 trencher, a mechanical means for making slits. The better stock 

 now available may safely be planted with the trencher, in furrows, 

 much as the first planting was done, but more rapidly and yet more 

 carefuUy. Where small lots of trees are to be planted, and the ques- 

 tion of initial expense is not so important as the obtaining of imme- 

 diate success, the cone method of planting should undoubtedly be 

 used. 



Greater care in handling the trees, with the elimination of the 

 water bucket as a transporting vessel, and the avoidance of long 

 storage, either in storehouses or boxes, have assisted the work. 



Undoubtedly, the most important single factor is earlier spring 

 planting, which also makes possible earlier transplanting and earlier 

 seed sowing. The conditions in the sand hills at the time when the 

 frost leaves the ground are usually favorable. The soil is moist, and 

 the trees are ready to grow. With each day the moisture is dis- 

 sipated, the heat becomes greater, and the danger that the tree will 

 become dried out before its roots can establish themselves in the 

 new site, is greatly increased. With these facts recognized, it is cer- 

 tain that only exceptional and unusually damaging conditions can 

 bring failure. 



O 



