American Forestry 



Vol. XVI 



AUGUST, 1910 



No. 8 



PLANTING FORESTS IN KENTUCKY 



By J. B, ATKINSON 



OF ALL the great questions to be 

 solved in this country of ours, 

 that of forestry is preeminent. 

 It is the one closest to every citizen. 

 It is related to agriculture, to the navi- 

 gation of our rivers, to the rainfall as 

 regards great floods or great droughts, 

 to the mining industry of coal, iron, 

 gold, silver, in fact, of all metals dug 

 from the earth. Timber is as neces- 

 sary to all mining operations as is labor. 



Twenty years ago, the St. Bernard 

 Alining Company of Earlington began 

 to plant trees on lands that had largely 

 been turned out as no longer valuable 

 for the growth of tobacco and corn. 

 My experience as a mining man indi- 

 cated to me that the time would come 

 when timber would be far more valu- 

 able and difficult to secure for mining 

 operations. 



At that time I had given little thought 

 as to the time it takes our forest trees 

 to mature, and had little knowledge of 

 tree growth. Much timber of the many 

 varieties growing in our Kentucky for- 

 ests had been cut, and the study of tree 

 growth began by counting the annular 

 rings of the stumps, and much time was 

 spent, then and since, in determining 

 how long it took the destroyed tree to 

 grow. I was surprised and interested. 

 The following table shows the number 

 of years it took various trees to reach 

 the diameter given : 



Age, Diameter. 



Variety years inches 



Hackberry 115 25 



White elm 120 27 



Black oak 148 28 



Black willow 50 18 



Sassafras 112 19 



Sugar maple 155 38 



Swamp maple 134 28 



Blue ash 273 36 



Yellow chestnut 



Oak 1 86 21 



Post oak 150 20 



White oak 261 48 



Scrub oak 150 15 



Red oak 147 27 



Sycamore 260 57 



Tulip tree 225 57 



Black locust 45 13 



Beech 165 36 



Hop hornbeam 55 13 



Sweet gum 184 34 



Sour gum 141 25 



Black walnut 189 29 



Wild cherry 46 16 



Shell-bark hickory 120 12 



King nut hickory 163 19 



Pig nut hickory 163 13 



Kentucky coffee' 25 5 



Spanish oak 220 38 



Texas red oak 215 43 



White oak 173 33 



White oak 312 36 



White oak 290 35 



White oak 275 35 



White oak 297 31 



White oak 310 3(1 



White oak- 325 41 



This list includes thirtv varieties of 

 our most prominent forest trees. Dur- 

 ing these twenty years, especial attention 

 has been given to finding the growth 



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