66 TIMHER PINES OF THE SOUTHERN UNITED STATES. 



aft IT fifteen or twenty years, when the trees have reached a diameter of 12 inches, they can be 

 tapped for resin and will give a continuous revenue. Under careful management, and by tapping 

 only the trees which should be removed in thinnings to make light for the rest, this revenue can 

 be obtained without in any way impairing the final harvest value. 



CONCLUSION. 



From the southern frontier of Virginia, throughout the lower part of the Southern States, to 

 the limits of high and compact forest growth west of the Mississippi River, spread over an area of 

 from 90,000 to 100,000 square miles, the forests of the Longleaf Pine still present a stupendous tim- 

 ber wealth. Yet, if we deduct the farm lands, and consider that large areas have been culled or 

 entirely denuded of the original growth, we may estimate that the amount of timber standing can 

 at best not exceed 100,000,000,000 feet, and is probably much less, while the cut, which at present 

 does not fall short of 3,700,000,000 feet, board measure, is bound, as the Northern pine is giving 

 out, to increase at even greater rate than in the past. Under such a strain, outstripping by far 

 the possibilities of their reproduction, the exhaustion of the resources of these forests within the 

 near future is inevitable, and if the devastation under present management by the naval store 

 industry and the destruction caused by fire and domestic animals is continued their extermi- 

 nation as far as practical purposes are concerned must be regarded as equally certain. 



