I902. 



FORESTRY AND IRRIGATION. 



439 



Forest Work 

 in Texas 



for the irrigation of lands in the \-alley 

 floors. 



Assistants to the geographer in charge 

 are Messrs. F. G. Plummer, Arthur Dod- 

 well, Theodore F. Rixon, and H. B. 

 Avres. 



The Bureau of Forestry 

 has sent a party of for- 

 esters and student assist- 

 ants to Kirbyville, Texas, to make a 

 working plan for the management of a 

 million and a quarter acres of longleaf 

 pine lands owned by the Kirby Lumber 

 Company. 



The party will be divided into four 

 <:amps. One permanent camp will be 

 e.stablished at Kirbyville ; the three 

 other camps will move from place to 

 place, wherever the work takes them. 

 Kach camp will be in charge of an ex- 

 pert forester. The entire work will be 

 directed by Field Assistant Thomas H. 

 Sherrard. Dr. A. D. Hopkins, of the 

 Division of Entomology, U. S. Depart- 

 ment of Agriculture, will make, in co- 

 operation with the Bureau of Forestry, 

 a special study of insects found on the 

 Kirby Lumber Company's timberlands. 

 The present undertaking is begun in 

 response to the request of the Kirby 

 Lumber Companj^ that its timberlands 

 be put under such management that 

 they will 3'ield a steady supply for its 

 lumber mills. The working plan will 

 be the most extensive of any yet made 

 in this country for a lumber compan}-, 

 and the work will require the services 

 of about 40 men for six months. 



J- 



It is of interest to note 

 that ant eggs are a com- 

 mercial product for sale 

 on the market in dried form at all times 

 of the year. These eggs are imported 

 from Africa, where they are found in 

 large quantities in the huge anthills, 

 which are quite common in that country. 

 The ant that lays these eggs is not a 

 true ant, but a termite a class of in- 

 sects which feed on wood to such extent 

 that they do great damage to buildings 

 in tropical countries. 



The accompanying illustration shows 

 a termite's nest on the end of a fence 



TERMITE'S NEST ON A FENCE POST IN CUBA. 



post in Cuba. These eggs are sold in 

 dry form and are used as food for young 

 pheasants, and are worth about fifty 

 cents a pound. They are scalded until 

 they swell to their natural size, and 

 then mixed with meat scrap and corn 

 meal and fed to young birds of the 

 pheasant type. 



Wood-Eating: 

 Ants. 



An Old In a letter to Science, 



Cedar. Dr. Charles E. Bessey, 



of the Universit}^ of Ne- 

 braska, states that in the Garden of the 

 Gods, near Pike's Peak, Colorado, there 

 are many large specimens of the Brown 

 Q,e.6.a.r,Jtaiipcn{s monospenna (Engelm.) 

 Sargent. During a recent visit to that 

 place it occurred to Dr. Bessey that these 

 trees must be ver}^ old. He was fortun- 

 ate enough to find the stump of a re- 

 cently cut tree, on which it was easy to 

 distinguish the annual growth-rings. 

 These were coinited for a section of the 

 trunk, care being taken to select a por- 

 tion in which the rings were of aver- 

 age thickness, and on this basis the 

 number for the whole stump was calcu- 

 lated. In this wav it was found that 



