648 AMERICAN FORESTRY 



established withiu this forest. When experiments were being conducted to 

 determine a suitable locality for a nursery, a small area was selected in Jones 

 Park, about three miles above the Bear Creek plantation, in Bear Creek Valley 

 All of the stock raised in this nursery had been removed to the Monument 

 Nursery and to other localities except about 20,000 three-year-old Douglas fir 

 seedlings of which 15,000 were recently removed from this abandoned nursery 

 to the Cascade plantation, which is on the north fork of Cascade Creek, three 

 miles west of Cascade, a summer resort, ten miles west of Colorado Springs 

 on the Colorado Midland Railway. This plantation is located at an elevation 

 of 9,000 feet, with an average slope of about thirty degrees and a north and 

 northeast exposure. The 15,000 Douglas fir seedlings should do well on this 

 area, as the stand of timber which formerly covered these slopes was of 

 this species. In addition to the plants which were raised in the abandoned 

 nursery formerly located in Jones Park, 15,000 four-year-old Douglas fir 

 seedlings from the Monument nursery are being planted on this important 

 watershed. These plants are particularly fine-looking and sturdy, and it is 

 believed they will make a rapid and successful growth. 



The old Pike's Peak State Road from Cascade to the summit of Pike's 

 Peak, forms the northern boundary of this plantation. The land to the 

 westward of this road having an easy slope with a southern exposure is well 

 adapted to the planting of yellow pine. This slope has been selected as a 

 suitable area to determine whether it will not be practical to plant two-year-old 

 yellow pines from the nursery instead of three or four-year-old plants. Five 

 hundred of these plants will be set out before May 10. If this experiment 

 proves that this plan is feasible, it can be readily seen that a considerable 

 expense will be saved in the production of these seedlings. Altogether 104,700 

 plants of difl'erent species have been planted on the Pike National Forest, 

 covering an area of approximately 78 acres. 



In addition to this, areas aggregating 46 acres have been planted in the 

 vicinity of Clyde and Palmer Lake, 108,000 plants having been set out during 

 1905, 1907, 1908, and 1909. The larger part of these areas is located in 

 Limbaugh Canyon, a short distance south of Palmer Lake. This work was 

 largely experimental and served as a means of perfecting the system of raising 

 and transplanting seedlings. 



The yearly output of the Monument nursery is 500,000 plants, and as 

 many as this should be set out each year upon the watersheds within the Pike 

 National Forest. Great progress has been made in nursery practice during the 

 past two years and the efficiency in handling the plants in the nursery, as well 

 as in the field, has been increased one hundred per cent. Only last year it 

 was considered that a field planter did a good eight-hour day's work if he 

 planted 250 seedlings. During the month of April, 1911, a gang of six planters, 

 working on the Cascade plantation, averaged five hundred plants per day per 

 man. 



While the men of the Pike National Forest are very well pleased with the 

 results of their efforts toward reforestation through field planting during the 

 past two years, they have tried another method, that of sowing the seed of 

 the coniferous trees adapted to the locality which it is desired to reforest. 



A large number of exi)eriments along this line have been made during the 

 past few years. Most of these experiments were conducted on a small scale, 

 until the spring of 1910, when some 275 acres of denuded lands on the Denver 

 watersheds were sown with 507 pounds of Douglas fir seed. This area is 

 located on Trail Creek, just west of the old settlement of Pemberton, which is 

 some twenty-five miles south of South Platte station. Trail Creek is a 



