EDITORIAL 



645 



Doubtless the resolution advocating the abolition of the 

 station was not adopted because of any desire to injure 

 a valuable line of Forest Service work but because of 

 unfamiliarity with this work. Unfortunately the cattle 

 and sheep men are not the only ones in this position. 

 The majority of lumbermen and timberland owners are 

 probably equally ignorant of the work of the Fort Valley 

 and other experiment stations. It would not be surpris- 

 ing if a considerable proportion of the general public 

 never heard of forest experiment stations and have no 

 conception of their place in the perpetuation of our for- 

 est resources. Even to Congress the stations are largely 

 an unknown quantity, and this ignorance of their activi- 

 ties and value doubtless played an important part in the 

 reduction for the present fiscal year of the appropriation 

 for the maintenance of such stations. 



As a matter of fact, forest experiment stations must 

 be depended on to furnish the fundamental facts on which 

 to base the management of the forests of the country. 

 They are comparable to agricultural experiment stations, 

 the value of which is universally recognized, but are if 

 anything even more essential since they deal with a long- 

 hved crop which can be thoroughly studied only by 

 carefully organized investigations covering a considerable 

 period of years. If any of the various forest programs 

 now being agitated are to be made really effective, the 



measures which they propose must be based on results 

 secured in large part at adequately manned and equipped 

 for*6t experiment stations. American Forestry would 

 like to see such stations established at the earliest possi- 

 ble opportunity in every one of the principal forest re-' 

 gions in the country. 



Every timberland owner, every lumberman, and every 

 other user of forests and forest products is more of less 

 intimately affected by the way in which our forest re- 

 sources are handled and should consequently be interested 

 in the adequate development of those agencies which will 

 make our forest management as effective as possible. 

 There is therefore a real reason why they should be- 

 come familiar^ with the work which the forest experi- 

 ment stations are now doing and give their support to 

 the extension of this work to the entire country. In this 

 case it is safe to say that familiarity will breed, not con- 

 tempt, bu|t a lively interest in and appreciation of the 

 past accomplishments and future possibilities of the sta- 

 tions. Close co-operation between the stations and those 

 benefiting from the results of their work will prove of 

 benefit to botfi, and American Forestry hopes that such 

 co-operation will be much more general in the future 

 than it has been in the past. That it will be a paying in- 

 vestment for all concerned there can be no doubt. 



BRITISH IMPERIAL FORESTRY CONFERENCE 



r P HE British Empire Forestry Conference held in Lon- 

 * don last summer constituted a notable event for 

 foresters and others interested in forest conservation 

 throughout the world. That such a conference should 

 have been called in a country which has hitherto been 

 notoriously indifferent to its forest resources is in itself 

 a significant fact. Added significance is given by the 

 cosmopolitan character of the attendance, which was 

 made up of thirty-five delegates from all parts of the 

 empire. These will carry home with them new ideas and 

 new inspiration for the work which lies ahead. Their 

 deliberations and conclusions should also result in a 

 decided stimulus to the forestry movement in other coun- 

 tries as well as in the British Empire. 



The resolution's adopted by the conference were re- 

 markably comprehensive and farsighted. Each of the 

 governments included in the Empire was urged to lay 

 down a definite forest policy to be administered by a 

 properly constituted and adequate forest service. This 

 policy should aim at securing a sustained yield from all 

 classes of timber, encouraging the most economical utili- 

 zation of Wood and other forest products, and maintain- 

 ing and improving climatic conditions in the interests of 

 agriculture and water supply. A high standard is thus set 

 which it will be difficult for any government or individual 

 administration to ignore. 



The Imperial Forestry Conference proved conclusively 

 the advantages to be derived from an inter-change of 

 ideas by the responsible forest officers and others inter- 

 ested in forestry throughout the far-flung British Em- 



relations between the various parts of the empire. Is 

 there any reason why similar but more far-reaching re- 

 pire. It wil? undoubtedly result in a clearer recognition 

 of the problems involved, in a more aggressive attempt to 

 solve them, and in the establishment of closer commercial 

 suits could not be obtained through a still more inclusive 

 world conference? Surely Canada is fully as interested 

 from an economic standpoint in the forests and forest 

 policy of the United States and Argentina as in those 

 of Nigeria or New Zealand. With the steadily increasing 

 depletion of the timber supplies of the world each country 

 is becoming more interested in the forest resources of its 

 neighbors, both near and far, and in the development of 

 trade relations. The United States now imports spruce 

 from Canada and oak from Japan ; Brazil imports long- 

 leaf pine from the United States; Great Britain imports 

 mahogany from Mexico ; China imports teak from India, 

 and so it goes. Each country is becoming more and more 

 dependent on some other country to meet some particu- 

 lar need, and as a result the forest problem is becoming 

 less local and more international in character. Why then 

 would not a world conference for the discussion of for- 

 estry questions of mutual interest be well worth while? 

 The next meeting of the British Empire Forestry Con- 

 ference is to be held in Canada in 1923. American For- 

 estry would like to see this followed by a world forestry 

 conference which the United States would take the lead 

 in arranging. It is none too early to begin to consider 

 ways and means of holding such a conference, the ground 

 to be covered, and the objects to be achieved. 



