1906 



FORESTRY AND IRRIGATION 



185 



800 metre gauge ties and to net about 

 $250 ! Such a stumpage price seems 

 almost increditable. The chir pine, al- 

 tnorgh always more accessible and 

 cheaper to log, is worth only $1 to 

 $5 per tree. It is hand sawed into 

 scantlings of small dimensions and 

 driven with the deodar down the riv- 

 ers to market. Recently it has been 

 tapped for resin. 



The chir pine is not of rapid de- 

 velopment. According to measure- 



based upon the length of time required 

 to grow the smallest merchantable size 

 as determined from stem analysis. In 

 Jaunsar they regulate the cutting by 

 the well known method of periods. 

 For example, if a rotation of 160 years 

 had been adopted and the area of for- 

 est were 1,600 acres the working plan 

 would allot 400 acres to each of the 

 four periods. That is, the first 400 

 acres would be cut over and repro- 

 duced during the first 40 years, and 



Fig. 2. Over mature chir pine forest on Chatragdh showinag windfalls of over 

 mature trees and advance reproduction due to protection from fire. 



merits made by the Indian Forest Ser- 

 vice it takes some 100 years to grow 

 a tree 15 inches (see fig. 2) in diame- 

 ter. It is a prolific seeder, however, 

 every two or three years, and with 

 protection from fire the reproduction 

 is a certainty. Owing to this ease of 

 obtaining reproduction the manage- 

 ment of these pine forests is perhaps 

 the simplest in India and the most suc- 

 cessful. They usually adopt a rotation 



so on until at the end of 150 years the 

 last of the 1,600 acres has been cut 

 and the first acre cut contains a forest 

 159 years old. This method of thus 

 securing a uniform and normal aged 

 forest with a regulation of the yield 

 has numerous drawbacks. Suppose the 

 forest is mature, as is the case in Jaun- 

 sar. then the part which must wait for 

 cutting 140 to [60 years will have lost 

 a vast per cent of timber by death and 



