THE SITUATION IN MICHIGAN 



1067 



abolish the office and turn all lands in the State over to 

 the Public Domain Commission, and the Land Office is 

 now a thing of the past. All State lands are now under 

 the control of the Public Domain Commission, with the 

 exception of lands granted by the United States Govern- 

 ment for specific purposes, such as the primary school, 

 agricultural college and university lands; and all lands 

 under the control of the Commission will eventually be 

 used for forestry purposes. 



At the request of the Public Domain Commission, the 

 Legislature also passed an act allowing the State to 

 exchange lands with the United States Government, cor- 

 porations and private individuals, for the purpose of con- 

 solidating its forest reserves. Later, Congress author- 

 ized the exchange of United States Government lands 

 with the States so that it could procure the lands within 

 the boundaries of its reserves. Under this act 50,000 

 acres have been examined for exchange with the United 

 States Government and private individuals, and the ex- 

 change of about 1,600 acres has been made with private 

 individuals. 



The Commission also has the right to buy lands for 

 forest reserves. 



The purpose of these measures is to consolidate the 

 present reserves by the elimination of private holdmgs 

 of non-agricultural lands. There are fifty-two State for- 

 ests in Michigan at present, the two largest of which each 

 contain about sixty square miles or 38,000 acres of land. 

 The majority are at present small in size and composed 

 of somewhat scattered holdings, which must in the future 

 be brought together. 



This need of consolidation has been emphasized by the 

 improvement work actively undertaken upon five of the 

 forest reserve areas. Forest planting to restore the forest 

 is a necessity on most of the Michigan reserves. Re- 

 peated fires following logging have left no second growth 

 of value over wide areas. Planting demands fire protec- 

 tion consisting of fire lines, watch towers and telephones, 

 with the accompanying force of lookouts and rangers, 

 without whom no amount of physical preparation would 

 avail. Planting also requires much labor, supervision, 

 teams and equipment, including nurseries. This calls for 

 houses, barns, barracks and waterworks. Such a plant 

 must serve a large area to be economical and efficient. 



Michigan has had such a plant on the Higgins Lake 

 Forest Reserve, of 13,580 acres, for several years, and 

 has also installed headquarters houses,, barns, lookout 

 towers, fire lines, telephones upon the Houghton Lake, 

 Fife Lake, Lake Superior and Ogenaw State Forests, 

 whose areas are, respectively, 38,578, 7,102, 38,007 and 

 4,199 acres, bringing a total of 101,468 acres under ad- 

 ministration. Two more forests will be put under man- 

 agement during 1915, but, although the Commissioners 

 intend to extend the work of bringing the remaining 

 forests under management, they will find it increasingly 

 expensive as the areas administered become smaller and 

 more scattered. 



The work of forest planting and fire line construction 

 initiated and brought through its experimental stages by 

 the old Forestry Commission at Higgins Lake has been 



greatly expanded and as more funds became available 

 initiated on other reserves. A standard fire line is in use, 

 following the section lines, as the country is so flat as to 

 preclude any advantage of ridge lines. These fire lines 

 are first cleared 16 feet wide, then grubbed of stumps 

 and roots for 12 feet, then a 10-foot strip is plowed. 

 This strip is cultivated twice a year to preserve a dirt sur- 

 face and destroy grass or other growth. Two hundred 

 and seven miles of line have been built, at a cost per mile 

 varying from $47.09 to $81.94, although by utilizing old 

 logging railroad grades the cost per mile was but $8.63. 

 The lines serve as vantage points for backfiring, and may 

 even stop a small fire automatically, but can never be 

 depended upon to do it without the active work of fire 

 patrols. From these lookout towers, in which lookouts 

 are kept during the dry and dangerous seasons, there 

 radiates 20.5 miles of telephone lines, connecting head- 

 quarters and the nursery. These lines are used only for 

 forest protection purposes. On one reserve is a specially 

 equipped automobile that takes the first crew to the fire 

 when it is discovered. Later on they are followed by 

 the teams and equipment necessary to extinguish the 

 fire if it is too large a one to be handled by the first crew. 



The plantations are further protected by fire lines 

 around each forty acres. These plantations now cover 

 1,409 acres, and will be extended far more rapidly in the 

 future. Norway pine constitute 52 per cent of the area, 

 and white pine 38 per cent. Since the Norway pine is 

 practically free from dangerous insect and fungus ene- 

 mies and has a large measure of fire resistance after 

 attaining merchantable size, the preference shown for 

 this species is commendable. It also outgrows white pine 

 on sandy soil. It may be questioned whether this policy 

 of close planting, up to 2,300 plants per acre, is sound 

 practice. The advantages of early securing a forest cover 

 and thus reducing the grass and inflammable herbage 

 must be offset against the certainty that such close stands 

 will soon become too crowded, and serious loss from 

 stagnation result before they reach a size permitting the 

 removal of profitable thinnings. Over 1,000,000 seed- 

 lings have been sold and distributed throughout the 

 State. Dead and down timber to the value of $3,363 

 has been sold. 



The appropriations for the work of the Commission 

 have gradually increased from $9,700 to $105,000 per 

 year. 



To sum up, Michigan ranks third in area of State 

 reserves, third in number of acres planted, fourth in 

 area of State forests, and fifth in size of State appro- 

 priations for forestry. Mr. Carton states that the num- 

 ber of acres set aside for forestry purposes should in 

 reality be listed as 600,000, as all of the lands belonging 

 to the State which are under the jurisdiction of the Pub- 

 lic Domain Commission are practically subject to ex- 

 change, and are in fact lands that will be used directly 

 for forestry purposes or exchanged for other lands to 

 be so used. When this process is completed, Michigan 

 will rank third in acreage of State forests. 



Many of these forests will be used for the propagation 



