A DEFINITE STATE FOREST POLICY 



423 



Photo by R. E. Goading. 

 PORTION OF LAKE CLEAR NURSERY, LAKE CLEAR JUNCTION, N. Y. 



The first forest planting on State 

 land was done in 1901 in the Catskills. 

 No appropriation for such work had 

 been made, but A. Knechtel and R. C. 

 Bryant, newly appointed State Fores- 

 ters, secured a gift of 500 white pine 

 and 500 Norway spruce transplants 

 from the nurseries of the New York 

 State College of Forestry at Axton 

 in the Adirondacks, and set them out 

 with help furnished voluntarily by resi- 

 dents near Phoenicia in the Catskills. 

 It is interesting to note that these trees 

 were grown originally in Germany, 

 shipped to this country as seedlings and 

 put out in transplant beds in New 

 York. It also happened that when the 

 first nurseries were started in connec- 

 tion with the Cornell demonstration 

 forest, white pine seeds were not avail- 

 able in this country, w r here this tree at 

 the time was king of lumber woods, 

 but they had to be obtained in Ger- 

 many from white pine forests started 

 from seed obtained in America over a 

 century before. 



From the humble beginning made in 

 1901 with a thousand trees, the State 

 reforestation work has grown until this 

 year over five million trees were 

 shipped from the State nurseries. In 

 the fall of 1001 an additional 5,000 



trees were planted but extensive opera- 

 tions did not begin until the following 

 spring. During April and May, 1902, 

 nearly 600,000 seedlings and trans- 

 plants were set in permanent planta- 

 tions in the vicinity of Lake Clear 

 Junction in the Adirondacks, this being 

 the largest planting operation under- 

 taken by State, Federal or private en- 

 terprise up to that time. The plant 

 material \vas procured from the Col- 

 lege of Forestry nurseries at Axton 

 and Wabeek, and was made up of 

 Scotch and white pine, Norway spruce 

 and European larch. It is significant 

 that the pines have made the best 

 growth during the ten years the plan- 

 tation has been established, being now 

 a solid forest of trees 10 to 15 feet 

 high. The spruce succeeded only on 

 the better lands and proved unsuited 

 for the more sterile burned-over areas. 

 This should carry a lesson to the pulp 

 and paper companies who are desirous 

 of reforesting with spruce, and sho\\ 

 the necessity of promptly replanting 

 logged areas before repeated fires have 

 impoverished the soil. 



During the years since the planting 

 was started the work has gone ahead 

 with rather fewer breaks than are to 

 be expected when legislative appropri- 



