The Value of Forests 19 



Closely related to this is the protection of bird life. The 

 value of birds as a factor in the control of insects is difficult 

 to estimate and is often overlooked, while the more subtle 

 service they render by their cheerfulness and their music 

 can never be measured by human standards. Yet without 

 the woods we have few birds. The birds and the woods 

 have lived together, and if either is destroyed they may 

 vanish together. 



There is a very direct relation between the timber supply 

 of a country and the life of the people. Perhaps no one 

 factor contributes more to the higher standard of living 

 in North America compared with Europe than the plentiful 

 supply of wood. Plenty of wood means cheap building 

 material. The cheap wooden building is only temporary, 

 and, as the condition of man improves, it is removed 

 to make place for a better and more permanent one. Thus 

 the log shanty of the pioneer gave place to the frame house 

 of the prosperous settler. This in turn is being replaced 

 by the modern, sanitary and convenient home of brick 

 and concrete. The knowledge, experience and resources 

 of three centuries were available before houses were built 

 which could not be readily changed. This prevented poor 

 living conditions being made permanent in brick and stone, 

 and change from being, if not impossible, at least very 

 difficult. Change in the character of buildings marks the 

 difference between a growing and a settled society. If it 

 is true that in a society where conditions are stationary, 

 the type of buildings remains unchanged, there is also truth 

 in the opposite statement, that if the buildings are of a 



