260 AMERICAN FORESTRY 



nation of New York moneyed men, is tion of the forests, and consequent con- 

 solidly intrenched in Paraguay and servation of natural supplies of water, 

 southwestern Brazil- another great many sections of the country could well 

 Chaco, or Indian country and is mak- be devoted to live stock and the culti- 

 ing ceaseless attempts to penetrate the vation of wheat, cotton, sugar and 

 quebracho region of Argentina. tobacco. But if the land is completely 



With the rapid extension of railroads striped of its forests, and no provision 



throughout the forestal regions of this be made for future growths, the coming 



section of southern South America, the generation will furnish another hard 



most serious drawback to the exploita- example of the cruel saddling of unneces- 



tion of their riches is being removed, sary burdens on the shoulders of unborn 



When the trees to be felled are away sons and daughters of the soil. In the 



from the water courses, cattle must haul case of the quebracho forests of Argen- 



the heavy logs through the dense forests, tina, this seems especially hard-hearted, 



Both cattle and men require fresh since the natural stock can be replaced 



water, or they cannot work. in twenty or thirty years an advantage 



On the other hand, the land border- seldom offered by hardwood as valuable 



ing the streams and rivers is generally as this. 



swampy and subject to overflows, and It might even be suggested that "the 



there are many rapids to be overcome leather manufacturers of the United 



in the best of the water courses. Rafting States, for the good of their sons and 



is therefore especially difficult, and the those who follow them in their indus- 



navigation companies, with their freight trial life, should urge upon the govern- 



steamers and schooners, as well as the ments of South America in whose 



few railways in the territory, have taken domains lie the forests of quebracho, 



advantage of the quebracho lumberman the desirability of the restoration of 



and extract manufacturer to charge denuded tracts, knowing, as they do, 



exorbitant rates for transportation, that the hemlock bark of their own 



The extension of trunk lines of railway woods has long since proved inadequate 



into the forest area, and the completion for their tannin demands upon it. In 



of the links which have brought it into our land, the denuded hemlock forests 



touch with Buenos Aires, the seaboard have been largely replaced by other 



and the world's markets, is so stimu- native trees and given over irrevocably 



lating the industries of the country to farms, villages and cities. In Argen- 



that the denudation of the timber lands tina and Paraguay, comparatively un- 



should be, more than ever, a matter of developed, the problem is simple as well 



present concern. With the fair protec- as urgent. 



*Photographs in this article by courtesy of the Pan-American Union. 



Canada has 23 million acres in timber reserves, as compared with 187 million acres in the national 

 forests of the United States. 



Apple wood is the favorite material for ordinary saw handles, and some goes into so-called brier 

 pipes. 



New Jersey has a timbered area of about two million acres, on which the timber is worth about 

 $8,500,000 on the stump. It is mainly valuable for cord-wood. 



Many of the forest fires attributed to railroads are caused not by sparks from locomotives, but by 

 cigar and cigarette butts thrown from smoking-car windows. 



P art Orford cedar of 'the Pacific coast, recently tried as a substitute for English willow in the manu- 

 facture of artificial limbs, has been found unsatisfactory. While it is light enough, it is too coarse and 

 brittle. 



As an experiment, the supervisor of the Beaverhead national forest is stripping the bark from the 

 bases of a number of lodgepole pine trees at various periods before they are to be cut for telephone poles. 

 This girdling causes the trees to exude resin, and it is desired to find what effect this may ha^e as a 

 servative treatment for the poles. 



