402 FOREST VEGETATION IN ^VERMONT. 



are of more value when devoted to wood than to cultivation. Without 

 doubt, the inhabitants of Southern New Hampshire derive more wealth 

 from their forests than from the cultivation of the soil, and if proper 

 measures were taken to prevent waste, and to care for the forests, it 

 could not fail to increase the prosperity of the people far more than it 

 has yet done. ( William T. Flint, Winchester, N. H.) 



Coos County. — The New Hampshire Board of Agriculture, at a ses- 

 sion held at Whitefield in December, 1873, visited a lumber-camp in this 

 county, the report of which has facts of interest in forestry. 



Attention was called to a white pine over 4 feet in diameter, and 200 

 feet or more high, said to be worth over S1,000 on the stump. Many 

 trees were worth from $100 to $500 each. The growth was principally 

 hemlock, pine, and spruce, and would yield in some instances 150,000 

 feet or more per acre. The average cost when purchased, was $11 The 

 compnny whose works they visited, owned 30,000 acres, mostly still 

 covered with forest, and had built some dozen miles of railroad into the 

 heart of the woods, using the ordinary T-rail. {Fourth Report, K. H. 

 Board of Agriculture, p. 54.) 



VERMONT. 



This State, which derived its name from the somber evergreen forests 

 which covered its mountains when first explored by Europeans, has lost 

 most of its importance as a lumber-producing State, although the manu- 

 facture of wooden articles still forms an important feature in its indus- 

 tries at many places. Most of the hewn timber which this State has 

 produced found a foreign market by way of Quebec, and the greater 

 part of its sawed lumber, was sent to American markets by way of the 

 Champlain Canal. 



The following facts concerning the woodlands of Washington County, 

 an interior county somewhat north of the central part, are furnished by 

 a correspondent : 



Mad Rivor is the largest tributary to the Winooski, and drains a narrow valley be- 

 tween ridges of the Green Mountains, with good farms along the intervales, and on 

 higher lands. Trees on the mountains, spruce and hemlock ; lower down, deciduous 

 kinds. Cedar is entirely wanting, and oak is rare. Sugar-maple is the most com- 

 monly planted for ornament ; next the elm, tamarack, and pine. Fruit-trees do well 

 on ground somewhat elevated, but only the hardiest kinds withstand the winters in 

 the valleys. The chestnut has been introduced, and does well on some hill-sides, as 

 also the locust in most places. The Baldwin apple fails. No planting for timber has 

 been done yet, but the growth of young trees is, in some cases, encouraged, especially 

 the sugar-maple, of which farmers can now tap twice the number they could twenty 

 years ago. In some cases sugar-orchards are fenced from cattle, and are soon filled with 

 a dense growth of young trees. I have a few acres, from which most of the timber, 

 except maples, was cut, and the land fenced, but have succeeded better in starting white 

 ash than maples. Since clearing, the springs and streams fail, and larger, deep streams 

 become variable. An early settler tells of our river once having long reaches of still 

 water, abounding in trout and" other fish. These places were caused by obstructions, 

 over which the water poured in a cataract. They are now gone ; the stream is shal- 

 low, so that " a man could almost drive a horse and wagon, the whole length, in low 

 water." The deep places are filled with gravel from the hills, and this is true of all 

 the lateral streams, which are alternately dry beds and torrents. A storm will now 

 raise the streams much quicker than formerly, and the floods subside as quickly. No 

 evidences appear to show less annual rain-fall, but the streams and fields dry up 

 sooner. No less snow fallp, but it seldom accumulates as formerly, and our winter 

 thaws and south winds carry it off very rapidly in many places where formerly shel- 

 tered by woodland. 



As to tendency to change of species, the spruce or hemlock will often come up in 

 place of hard- wood, and xnce versa. A considerable amount of lumber, chiefly spruce, 

 is got out yearly, the butt logs of best trees being sawed into clapboards, or split into 

 staves or shingles, and the rest sawed into board for market. Hemlock is extensively 

 cut for bark and coarse lumber for local use, it being too cheap to pay transportation. 

 Basswood comes next to spruce in value. White ash, birch, maple, &c., are cut. 

 Some manufactories of wooden bowls, chair-stock, clothes-pins, eave-apouts, «&c., exist. 

 {E. A. Fisk, Waitsfield, Vt.) 



