1899. 



AMERICAN FORESTRY ASSOCIATION. 



now closed, and that the era of sowing 

 the seed is now coming. He gave con- 

 siderable attention to the College of For- 

 estry at Cornell, explaining the courses 

 of study given by himself and Dr. Roth, 

 and stating that some 35 students are at 

 work this year, many from the agricul- 

 tural department of the University. 

 He thought that agriculture and forestry 

 would become more and more closely 

 connected as time went on. The Cor- 

 nell College would publish bulletins now 

 and then, discussing questions of tech- 

 nical forestry. He "'described the new 

 forest tract on which the college is to 

 demonstrate lumbering for profit, intro- 



ducing various methods in order to show 

 what are failures and what are success- 

 ful. He believed the so-called German 

 methods would be found successful and 

 sound. The tract will also be used to> 

 teach practical forestry and sylviculture 

 to students. The land has been given 

 to Cornell for thirty years, and so does 

 not come under the restrictions of the 

 State Constitution as to cutting. 



On motion of Mr. Keffer, a vote of 

 thanks was tendered the Cosmos Club 

 for kindly allowing the Association the 

 use of its hall. 



The meeting was then adjourned. 



New Growth on Burned Areas in Colorado, 



Prof. C. S. Crandall. 



It would be interesting to know with 

 some degree of exactness the time re- 

 quired to start a new forest growth on a 

 burned area, but recorded observations 

 are wanting. Some areas may and do 

 remain bare for long periods, while others 

 will develop new growth within a com- 

 paratively few years. The time may 

 thus vary greatly, because growth is 

 dependent upon local surroundings. 

 Denuded areas in the subalpine region, 

 where the rainfall is commonly greater 

 than below, show the influence of the 

 abundant moisture in the quality and 

 vigor of the herbaceous vegetation which 

 first follows a fire, but observation leads 

 me to the conclusion that in the higher 

 altitudes the forest trees are much slower 

 in starting, and that they start in less 

 numbers and develop much more slowly 

 than in the lower regions. 



That several years commonly elapse 

 between the burning and starting of 

 new coniferous growth seems indicated 

 by the following observations, the first 

 in the canon of the Cache la Poudre, on 

 a tract that was burned, according to 

 reliable authority, in the summer of 1881. 

 As examined in 1894, thirteen years after 

 burning, grasses were abundant among 



the dead logs, there were a few shrubs, 

 and a scattering growth of Pines, the 

 largest of which was twenty inches high 

 and seven years old.' Here it was 

 apparently six years after the fire that 

 the first Pine tree started. The other 

 observation was made on a tract extend- 

 ing south and west from Chambers' Lake r 

 which was burned over in July, 1890. 



I passed through the burned district a 

 month after the fire, and was greatly 

 impressed with the absolute desolation. 

 No green thing remained ; the ground 

 and everything upon it was clad in som- 

 ber black ; animal life was absent, and 

 there was something so oppressive in 

 the desolate solitude that I was glad to> 

 reach green timber again. A second 

 visit to this tract was made four years 

 later, in July, 1894, and it was with a 

 feeling of keen disappointment that I 

 noted how slight a change four years 

 had wrought. The intense blackness 

 had been subdued in some degree by the 

 action of the elements ; some trees had 

 fallen and others were losing their bark ; 

 but the general appearance of desolation- 

 remained. A few struggling plants of 

 grasses and sedges were the only evi- 

 dences of returning vegetation. 



