138 REPOET OF ONTARIO GAME No. 515 



still remains vested in the Crown 110,000,000 acres, much of which is 

 covered with valuable timber. Under the wise policy of the present 

 administration no township is thrown open to settlement without care- 

 ful inspection by a competent official, and if such township is found to 

 contain less than 40 per cent, of good land, it is withheld from settle- 

 ment for the growing of timber, thus largely checking the evil, so preva- 

 lent at one time, of allowing people to take up rough land, o'stensibly for 

 farming purposes but actually for the value of the timber on it, the 

 land being thus withdrawn from the operation of the timber license for 

 all timber excepting pine, and consequently depreciating the value of a 

 timber license in the district without compensatory benefit to the public, 

 for, when the supposititious settler had removed the timber, he departed, 

 leaving the land shorn of its trees and unimproved in other respects. 



At the present time it is estimated that the timber resources of the 

 Province attain a value of three or four hundred million dollars. This, 

 of course, is merely a rough approximation, based on the material value 

 of the woods on the market, and takes no account of the indirect value 

 of the standing forests. Were these to be taken into consideration also, 

 including the natural or economic irrigation of opened lands or of lands 

 unopened, the actual or potential value of all waterpowers in the Pro- 

 vince, the rainfall and the climate, it will be seen that the intrinsic 

 worth of the forests to the Province would be a sum so gigantic as to be 

 almost incalculable. So vital, indeed, is this asset that almost any 

 expenditure would be warranted in order to perpetuate and preserve it. 



Unfortunately the forests are not immune from dangers. Fires, 

 disease and other scourges are liable to attack them. In addition to 

 this, the growth to maturity of a tree is always a lengthy process ; in the 

 case, indeed, of many of the more valuable species occupying a period of 

 time in excess of the average human span of life ; so that if fire or disease 

 is allowed to run unchecked, or if the cutting is carried to such excess 

 that natural reseeding becomes impracticable, it is apparent not 

 only how greatly the forest asset may be quickly impaired, but also 

 that many years will be required to make good the damage effected 

 even under the most favourable circumstances. It is apparent, there- 

 fore, that it cannot but be the part of wisdom to take sufficient precau- 

 tions to reduce the risks of fire or other scourges to a minimum and to 

 adopt such measures as will prevent excessive cutting. 



The temptation to a licensee or owner of a timber limit to take the 

 utmost profit in the shortest possible time without regard to the future 

 is plainly great, and, indeed, in some countries such as Germany and 

 Sweden it has in consequence been held better in the public interests 

 that the State should administer and exploit the forests rather than 

 risk their destruction or depletion through individual greed or inca- 

 pacity. In a forest there wdll be found trees of all ages, and it is obvi- 

 ous that, no matter how long it may take trees to mature, if the per- 

 centage of cut is adjusted to the normal growth, an area of forest will 



