rt2 AMERICAN FOREST TREES 



about twenty-five per cent greater than white pine, and it is moderately 

 oft. The annual rings are rather wide, indicating rapid growth. The 

 bands of summerwood are narrow compared with the springwood, 

 which gives a generally light color to the wood, though not as light as the 

 wood of white pine. The resin passages are small and fairly numerous. 

 The sapwood is thick, and the wood is not durable in contact with the 

 soil. 



Norway pine has always had a place of its own in the lumber 

 trade, but large quantities have been marketed as white pine. If such 

 had not been the case, Norway pine would have been much of tener heard 

 of during the years when the Lake State pineries were sending their 

 billions of feet of lumber to the markets of the world. 



Because of the deposit of resinous materials in the wood, Norway 

 pine stumps resist decay much better than white pine. In some of the 

 early cuttings in Michigan, where only stumps remain to show how large 

 the trees were and how thick they stood, the Norway stumps are much 

 better preserved than the white pine. Using that fact as a basis of 

 estimate, it may be shown that in many places the Norway pine consti- 

 tuted one-fifth or one-fourth of the original stand. The lumbermen 

 cut clean, and statistics of that period do not show that the two pines 

 were generally marketed separately. In recent years many of the 

 Norway stumps have been pulled, and have been sold to wood-distilla- 

 tion plants where the rosin and turpentine are extracted. 



At an early date Norway pine from Canada and northern New York 

 was popular ship timber in this country and England. Slender, straight 

 trunks were selected as masts, or were sawed for decking planks thirty or 

 forty feet long. Shipbuilders insisted that planks be all heartwood, 

 because when sapwood was exposed to rain and sun, it changed to a green 

 color, due to the presence of fungus. The wood wears well as ship 

 decking. The British navy was still using some Norway pine masts 

 as late as 1875. 



The scarcity of this timber has retired it from some of the places 

 which it once filled, and the southern yellow pines have been substituted. 

 It is still employed for many important purposes, the chief of which 

 is car building, if statistics for the state of Illinois are a criterion for the 

 whole country. In 1909 in that state 24,794,000 feet of it were used for 

 all purposes, and 14,783,000 feet in car construction. 



For many years Chicago has been the center of the Norway pine 

 trade. It is landed there by lake steamers and by rail, and is distributed 

 to ultimate consumers. The uses for the wood, as reported by Illinois 

 manufacturers, follow : Baskets, boxes, boats, brackets, casing and frames 

 for doors and windows, crating, derricks for well-boring machines, doors, 



