1847.] Forest Trees of Massachusetts. 211 



more precise. The white or gray birch is of most rapid growth, 

 and springs at once from the stump. This may be profitably cut 

 in from 10 to 20 years; a growth of maple, ash and birch, black, 

 yellow and white, in 20 or 25; oaks in from 20 to 33. Where 

 the trees are principally oak, white, black and scarlet, the forest 

 may be cut clean three times in a century. Cedar swamps, 

 which grow from seed, cannot be profitably cut in less than 40 

 years. Pitch pines, which also spring only from seed, are very 

 slow at first, and require from 40 to 60 years to be in a condition 

 to be felled. In many places, the experiment has been tried of 

 burning over the surface, ploughing, and sowing with rye. When 

 the trees have been of hard w^ood, this practice has been strongly 

 condemned. In the case of the pitch pine, it is reccommended. 

 The seedling pines make much more rapid progress when the sur- 

 face has been softened by cultivation. 



"An intelligent gentleman of great experience, A. M. Ide, Esq., 

 of South Attleborough, gives me a statement of some important 

 facts bearing upon the subject. "Having been, for thirty years 

 past, more or less engaged in buying woodland and cutting it off, 

 I wish to state that I know, from careful observation, that an 

 acre of good land, where there is a mixture of the several kinds 

 of oak and walnut, (hickory,) cut off while young and thrifty, will 

 produce, during the first 25 or 30 years, a cord of wood yearly." 

 "I believe that most kinds of hard wood are worth twenty or thirty 

 per cent, more, for fuel, at the age of 25 years than at 75." This 

 important fact is confirmed by many of the w^ood-growers in the 

 Old Colony, and in other parts where the woods have been re- 

 peatedly cut down. It is remarkable that all the facts and testi- 

 mony lead to the same conclusion. The trees best for fuel shoot 

 again most readily and vigorously when cut under 25 years. The 

 wood is formed within that time as rapidly, taking a forest to- 

 gether, as at any other age; and, for fuel, It is then of most 

 value. 



" In cutting wnth a view to future timber, the tree should be 

 felled as close to the ground as possible, as the shoots will then be 

 erect. In cutting with a view to fuel, it is of less consequence. 

 Several suckers will be thrown out, all of which will be curved at 

 base, but they will all thereby, have more room to grow. 



"To the question, — "Stumps of trees of what age, when felled, 

 will shoot up most vigorously? Is there any age at which they 

 cease to shoot? What trees will not shoot from the stump?" the 

 answers are equally full. To the first of these questions, the uni- 

 form answer is, that the stumps of young, healthy, growing trees, 

 shoot most vigorously. They should not be under 15 years, nor 

 much over 20. The almost uniform answer to the second ques- 



