64 



SOUTHERN BOTTOMLANDS 

 ESTIMATED GROWTH IN loo YEARS 



Species 



Ash 



Cottonwood 

 Cypress. . . . 

 Red gum. . . 



Total height 



Ins. 

 I20 



no 

 100 



Yield per acre 



(3 inches and 



over dbh.) 



Cubic feet 

 10,400 

 12,000 



Timber Valuation. — The cost of estimating in this type is 

 seldom high, but neither can it be made low. An average figure 

 per acre is eight cents with a range from 5 to 15 cents. The 

 factors which work against low costs are: 



Inaccessibility. 



Irregularity of boundaries. 



Poor living conditions. 



Danger from snakes and disease. 



Swamp and bottomlands are not frequented by many people. 

 Hence they have few roads. Only the hunter, the hog grazer, 

 the logger, and the moonshiner are called by business, legitimate 

 or otherwise, to penetrate the back swamps and to none is a road 

 a necessity. Even the logger prefers to use water transportation. 

 Unfortunately, however, the estimator cannot do his work well 

 in a boat and must therefore be in the swamp when it is driest 

 and hence least accessible by the usual standards. Bottomlands 

 are governed entirely by topography so that they will not be 

 bounded by any geometric figures of ^man's devising. This 

 makes the task of determining the area of a tract to be estimated 

 one of great difficulty. Either the outside boundary must be 

 traversed or the estimate strips run close enough together to 

 catch up all the major indentations and excresences. The third 

 factor is really an outgrowth of the first. Where people do not 

 often go for business or pleasure, the living quarters are crude 

 makeshifts only. Hence it is usually difficult to find either a 

 comfortable logging camp or clean farm house to use as head- 

 quarters. If tents are used they must be raised above the flood 

 line, protected from roving hogs and cattle, and screened to keep 



