286 



FORESTRY AND IRRIGATION 



June 



vention and extinguishment of forest 

 fires. 



This report further states that the 

 standing timber in Minnesota is worth 

 easily $100,000,000, and it is this prop- 

 erty which the fire-warden system seeks 

 to protect. The state itself owns 

 2, 500,000 acres of land, a part of which 

 is forested and protected by the fire- 

 warden system. The state last Novem- 

 ber sold $600,000 worth of timber from 

 its own land, and has in all received 

 $4,000,000 for just the timber sold from 

 exclusively its lands which it received 

 as a gift from the United States. The 

 state will continue for many years to 

 sell timber of various kinds from these 

 lands, and is on this particular account 

 deeply interested in preventing damage 

 by forest fires. 



THE ORIGINAL PINE FORESTS 

 DISAPPEAR. 



One of the richest pine timber re- 

 gions of the Northwest was the Saginaw 

 and Huron Shore districts of Michigan. 

 In 1893 there were cut in that district 

 858,000,000 feet of pine ; but the sup- 

 p\y of pine timber had so diminished 

 during the next ten years that in 1903 

 only 52,000,000 feet were cut. The 

 number of feet of pine logs cut in 

 Minnesota the season 19021903 was 

 2,ooo,oco,ooo. The amount of pine 

 lumber cut in the year 1903 by the 

 mills in the districts of Duluth, Minne- 

 apolis, above Minneapolis and St. Croix, 

 was 2,200,628,000 feet, being over two 

 billion feet. A comparatively small 

 amount of this may have been from the 

 forests of Wisconsin. A liberal esti- 

 mate places the remaining standing 

 pine in Minnesota at 28,000,000,000 

 feet. Any one can judge for himself, 

 therefore, how soon this forest capital 



will be exhausted and say whether it is 

 not time to begin a system of reforesta- 

 tion by utilizing waste land in the pro- 

 duction of pine timber. 



WHAT FORESTRY MEANS FOR 

 MINNESOTA. 



What forestry means for Minnesota 

 is simply this : The remaining original 

 pine timber will be cut in the next fifteen 

 years. Some second growth pine, if 

 protected from fire, will then be cut 

 from year to year, but it will not be as 

 good as the original growth and there 

 will not be enough of it for home con- 

 sumption. Lumber will be dearer and 

 our great lumber industry will decline. 

 There are, however, fully three million 

 acres of waste land in scattered locali- 

 ties, which if planted with pine would 

 in time become normal forests, yielding 

 forever a supply sufficient for home 

 need. Such forests would by their 

 growth perpetually j'ield a net annual 

 revenue on the capital invested of three 

 per cent, compound interest, besides 

 many indirect benefits. On such waste, 

 sandy land it will take on an average 

 about eighty years for a crop of pine 

 trees to grow to merchantable size. 

 Individuals can not wait so long for a 

 crop and they will not engage in the 

 business. The state, to whom time 

 does not matter, must undertake the 

 work by purchasing waste land and 

 planting it with pine. 



The report gives an abstract of the 

 recent laws of different states for pre- 

 venting forest fires, discusses practical 

 forestry, argues that the state will gain 

 honor as well as money by treating its 

 forests and waste land with scientific 

 care, furnishes sketches of European 

 forestry, and contains several original 

 illustrations of Minnesota forests. 



