FOREST RESOURCES OP MINNESOTA. 533 



poorly timbered, a few scattering trees only marking their coarse over the naked 

 plain. 



On the Red River a narrow fringe of thick woods of the hard varieties commences at 

 Graham's Point, and coutiuues to Pembina, while all the streams on the east and west 

 sides aiiord narrow strips of timber, generally from 15 to 2o miles apart, while the in- 

 termediate plains above latitude 46° are dotted with clumps of poplars, willows, and 

 other aspenoids. 



The boundaries and characteristics of the " Big Woods," which form 

 a spur extending from the great wilderness of Northeastern Minnesota 

 southwestward along the valley of the Minnesota Eiver, and nt-arly to 

 Iowa, are described in an article by N. H. Winchell, published in the 

 Transactions of the State Horticultural Society, winter session, January, 

 1875, p. 47. The term is strictly applicable only to the Lower Minnesota 

 Valley, and the native outlines are very irregular, with isolated tracts 

 in some places. In this region some forty-five species of wood-bearing 

 plants are enumerated. 



The existence of this spur of woodlands extending into the prairie 

 region, and successfully resisting the fires that annually ran over this 

 country in former years, may justly be regarded as a phenomenon in 

 natural history worthy of careful study. It is noticed that its fauna 

 differs from that of the prairies, including the bear, wolf, deer, and birds 

 in great abundance, and it cannot fail of exerting a beneficial efi'ect 

 upon the climate of that region. It abounds in small lakes, and is as 

 yet but sparsely settled. 



A catalogue of the plants of Minnesota was prepared by I. A. Lap- 

 ham, of Milwaukee, in 1865, and is published in the Transactions of the 

 State Horticultural Society, January, 1875. As it gives no indications of 

 locality, abundance, or other facts beyond the name, we deem it proper 

 only to mention that it embraces fifty-seven species of timber- trees, or 

 large shrubs, and seventy-nine species of the minor woody plants and 

 vines. 



From the description of the State above given, it will appear that 

 Minnesota presents at the same moment an example of present abund- 

 ance and of extreme scarcity in a more marked degree than any State 

 east of the Mississippi, and that while on one side extensive lumbering 

 operations are going on, and new enterprises are being undertaken, 

 under the delusive appearance of " inexhaustible supply," the most 

 urgent need of timber-planting is felt on the other, not merely to create 

 a supply of material for fuel and farm purposes, but to afford protection 

 to man and beast and to farm and orchard against the fierce northern 

 winds of winter, and the drying southwest winds of summer. 



The necessity of timber-belts as a shelter from storms was never, per- 

 haps, more severely felt than in a storm of memorable severity, which 

 swept over several of the Northwestern States on the 7th, 8th, and 9th 

 of January, 1873, where, in the absence of such protection on the prai- 

 ries, suffering and death were reported from very many points. This 

 storm was particularly severe in Minnesota, but it was felt with great 

 force over a region extending from Manitoba and Dakota to Wisconsin 

 and Illinois, and in Kansas and Nebraska. With this experience in the 

 memory, arguments were not needed to show the value of a closely- 

 planted belt of forest-trees around the farm-buildings and along the 

 highways, and the public discussions upon this subject have tended to 

 awaken an interest in the question of plantations for shelter, that prom- 

 ises to be of lasting good. 



In a communication addressed to Gov. C. K. Davis, January 29, 1874, 

 by Mr. Leonard B. Hodges, in speaking of the treeless region in Minne- 

 sota — he takes three counties (Stevens, Grant, and Wilkin) as a fair 



