1899. 



AMERICAN FORESTRY ASSOCIATION. 



127 



The Relation of Forest Preservation to the 



Public Welfare. 



(Being an address delivered on Arbor Dav at the Montana State University at Missoula. ) 

 By the Superintendent of the United States Forest Reserves in Montana.. 



The celebration of Arbor Day seems a 

 most fitting occasion to consider briefly 

 the great question of our forests and to 

 note how we, as a nation, are guarding a 

 most priceless heritage. 



When the Puritans of New England 

 and the chevaliers of Virginia blazed 

 pathways in the primeval forests, made 

 clearings, and laid waste vast areas of 

 mighty Oaks, sturdy Elms, and giant 

 Hickories, it was deemed by them essen- 

 tial and proper for the onward march 

 of cizilization and necessary for the pro- 

 ductiveness of the country. Conditions 

 have very materially changed since then, 

 and as we stand at the dawn of the 

 Twentieth Century, we begin to realize 

 what the loss of our mighty forests means. 

 We begin to estimate their value not 

 alone in dollars and cents, but as affect- 

 ing our water supply and as an adjunct 

 to human as well as animal and vege- 

 table life, and we are now crying aloud 

 and long: "Oh! Woodman spare that 

 Tree." 



I believe it is right and proper that the 

 subject of our forests should be brought 

 to the attention of our teachers and of 

 our schools, and that in the school room 

 should be laid the foundation for the 

 rational treatment of the same. The 

 public generally, in years past, has given 

 but scanty attention to this great subject, 

 but if the youth of our land could but 

 be brought to understand the momen- 

 tous interests at stake the public would 

 gradually be led to realize the impor- 

 tance of the question. 



The forest area of the United States 

 (exclusive of Alaska and our recent 

 acquisitions) is estimated in round num- 

 bers at 500,000,000 acres. Seven-tenths 

 of this is found on the Atlantic coast, one- 

 tenth on the Pacific, one-tenth in the 

 Rocky Mountains, and the balance scat- 

 tered over the middle Western States. 



On the Pacific coast hard woods are rare, 

 the principal growth being coniferous 

 and of extraordinary development. Here 

 we find the gigantic Red woods, the soft 

 Sugar Pine, the hard Bull Pine, as well 

 as Spruces, Firs, Cedars, Hemlocks and 

 Larch. In the Rocky Mountains we have 

 no hard woods of any great commercial 1 , 

 value, the growth being mainly Spruces,. 

 Firs, Pines and Cedars, In the Southern* 

 States we find the Cypress and a great: 

 growth of hardwoods with some conifers- 

 and some small quantities of Spruce, Fir 

 and Hemlocks. In the north Atlantic 

 States we find hardwood with conifers 

 intermixed, and the same along the lakes, 

 in Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota. 



In 1896 it was estimated that there 

 was then standing throughout the United* 

 States 2,300,000,000,000 feet, board 

 measure, of timber. In the census of 

 1890 the value of forest products was 

 estimated at $1,044,000,000. The value 

 exceeds ten times the value of our gold 

 and silver output, and three times the 

 annual product of all our mineral and 

 coal mines put together. It is three 

 times the value of our wheat crop, and 

 with all the toil and risk which our agri- 

 cultural crops involve they can barely 

 quadruple the value of the product 

 yielded by nature for the mere harvest- 

 ing. 



The total annual cut is estimated at 

 40,000,000,000 feet, board measure, and 

 to this let us add the amount consumed 

 for fuel, fence material, the waste in the 

 woods and at the mills, and the loss by 

 fires, and we find that the total annual 

 consumption of wood in the United 

 States is easily 25,000,000,000 cubic feet, 

 and this consumption, it is said, increases- 

 in greater proportiun than the popula- 

 tion. 



In considering this vast consumption 

 of wood it is interesting for Montanians. 



