Our FiiiTst Rcstnt I'roUtin. 



61 



with ;ill pessimists who say: '()|i, 

 \oii can iR'Vor reduce the liiT-daiiK'-r 

 Miriicifiiily to make I'oi'cstry wortli 

 whili'.' It is true tiiat tiie dry 

 interior climate here and hi^di winds 

 make the dant,'er latlier {jjreater for 

 us tlian it is in Europe; but not ser- 

 iously so, antl over there, except in 

 Kussia, the aniuuil fire loss is now an 

 entirely negligible quantify. 



The Forestry Hrancli is this very 

 winter adopting active measures to 

 install, extend and buttress the 

 patrol system on all the reserves, 

 with special attention to the Hiding 

 .Mountains. Some lifteen good look- 

 out hills were located around that 

 reserve, and as fast as possible tow- 

 ers will be erected on those and men 

 installed in the danger season, with 

 telephone connection to the Chief 

 Kanger. Trail extension and im- 

 provement is being pushed. Tin- 2(52 

 miles of boundary line round this re- 

 serve has jiractically all bfen cut out 

 eight to sixteen feet wide and will 

 be turned into a road or bridle-path, 

 as the local topography will l)est 

 permit. This boundary trail will also 

 have some value as a fire line. 



To safeguard this reserve still fur- 

 ther against insweeping settler and 

 prairie fires, a jdowed guard is now 

 l)eing made al()ng the s(»uth and 

 west, twelve to sixteen feet wide. As 

 a start .'^5 miles was done last sum- 

 mer, with two team of oxen on a 

 breaking plow, if the pidilie will 

 but grant its sympathetic co-opern- 

 tii^n and a decent amo\int of money, 

 the Forestry Branch will umicrtakc 

 to ade<nuit<>ly protect the reserves. 



Renewing the Forest. 



Mr. Warren, a forester from the 

 I'nited States, who visited over ir»(> 

 rierman coniferous forests in I'.'ll 

 reports that on ordy three of them 

 was natural reprodu<f ion being de- 

 pende<l upon; that is to say. in 

 ninety-eight p<r tent, of (ii>rman for- 

 ests natural regeneration has be«>n 

 discarded as beinu' too uncertain. 



Planting gives them straight, uiii- 

 form trees, whiidi have a market 

 value right from the first thinninff 

 to the final cut. 



Jn our case, however, the fact that 

 we have on these western reserve* 

 sufh large ar<-as to re-clothe, as c«»m- 

 pared with (Jermany, coupi«MJ with 

 the further fart that labor her«- ccjsts 

 three to five times as much a.s there, 

 makes it obligatory for us \< ' da 



to contiinie diligent exp lAs, 



looking first toward developing, if 

 possible, satisfactory methods of na- 

 tural reproduction of •• ' - tim- 

 ber as it is cut away, or, . — ..^ tliat. 

 the successful sowing of seed on a 

 large scale. It looks at present as 

 though the planting out of nursery- 

 grown trees might be too c(t.«,tly an 

 operation for general adoption on 

 our reserves. 



And yet. would it be? Kvery \'-.u. 

 you, the owners of these reserves, 

 are losing thousands and thousands 

 of (lollars on account of the vast 

 areas of land now lying idle a.s the 

 residt of original denudation l»y lire 

 • •r lundierman and repeated fires 

 since. 



I thiid< we should all be ap|>alled 

 if we eould once get a clea'- .int.rn- 

 eiation of the tremendous 

 volved in the continued holding of 

 all this land as unproduetix^ 

 True, one might say in cn»> .; _ 

 Kiding Mountain reserve, that there 

 was not nnieh of the land but iiad 

 frees of sonu' sort on if Hn* *' *'er 

 .N'ature knows nauglit of bi, <>r 



eeononjies — in fact sht ledly 



favors the comparatively u 

 poplar or balsam fir instead <• ■• 

 really valuabb- spruce. Topl.Tr i^ 

 normally so defe«'tive from di 

 frost-crack, wiml '•» 



r>e hardly worth lum • -^dl 



_\ MU ari' peiihiiiing 'f lnnd 



that will grow the fin 

 or, for all that is ' **»n- 



trary, i-ven re«l or - . ■ , •• 



One hundre«l years niro th«» public 

 forests of Denmark were an almost 

 pure stand of relatively valueW 



