. . THE REDWOOD OF CALIFORNIA. 601 



and fifty miles, terminating in Sonoma County. From Valhalla, the 

 north boundary-line of Sonoma, to Eussian River the country along the 

 coast is timbered, and this timber extends inland about eight miles. 

 The timber in the Russian River bottom' is not surpassed on the coast. 

 Fed by the rich alluvial soil and watered by annual overflows, the 

 trees grow to an enormous size, some being 150 feet without a limb, and 

 cases have occurred in which a single tree has been worked up into 

 65,000 feet of lumber, worth at least $1,000.^ 



The redwoods are not continuous, several interruptions occurring from 

 change of geological formation from sandstone to lime-rock, or from the 

 lowering of level. An instance of the former is seen at Tomales Bay ; and 

 of the latter from the lower foot-hills of Tamalpais down to Belmont. A 

 connecting link is found, however, on the Oakland hills, and that grove 

 of redwood, now almost destroyed, affords the strongest evidences of 

 the dependency of this species on the prevalence of heavy mists. A 

 few individual trees occur across the Oregon line, but none of commer- 

 cial importance. A few small patches occur in Marion County, but these 

 are fast passing away. It also occurs in Klamath and Del Norte Coun- 

 ties, in more or less disconnected patches. The redwood belt, at its best, 

 is almost fifteen miles wide, but the average width is much less. 



This is one of the very few of the conifers that sprouts from the stump 

 when cut down. Fire is destructive to the young trees only, and after 

 gaining a thickness of two or three feet, they are not liable to injury 

 from this cause. The roots seem imperishable, and as soon as the tree 

 is cut, they sprout and cover the soil rapidly, to the exclusion of every 

 other species, none being of so rapid growth. The indestructibility of 

 the roots prevents the clearing of such lauO, and even large trunks cut 

 down, cover themselves, within two or three years, with sprouts so com- 

 pletely that they can scarcely be seen. The entire aftergrowth on the 

 Oakland hills is owing solely to this growth from the roots and stumps. 

 This tenacity of life shows itself also in the resistance it offers to fire. 

 Trees that have been bereft completely of their branches by fire, will 



1 The wood in the tree standing is valued at the present time at $2 per M feet, a 

 yield of 150,000 to the acre, or 6,000,000 on a forty-acre lot is an average on good 

 lauds. The very iinest timber on the margin of the streams would produce at least 

 800,000 feet to the acre, and this yield runs down to 25,000 feet. As the redwood be- 

 longs to the foggy coast region, and as the supply south of San Francisco has been cut 

 off, Sonoma, Humboldt, and Mendocino Counties may be said to have the monopoly of 

 this timber while it lasts. 



The yield of redwood lumber in 1876 was estimated at about 216,000,000 of feet. 



The redwood is a close-grained timber, splits true, is very light in color, like the red 

 cedar of the Eastern Slates. It works smoothly under the plane, and is not liable to 

 warp or shrink. Its durability cannot be questioned, as hundreds of miles of fences 

 twenty years old and etill sound bear evidence. Hence it has been nsed largely for 

 fence-posts and railroad-ties. Sonoma and Mendocino Counties furnish large quanti- 

 ties of ties to the Central Pacific Railroad. It is also used on the Southern Pacific, and 

 is largely laid on the desert of the Colorado and in Peru. The late Henry Meigs, the 

 projector of extensive railroad enteriirises in South America, once owned a mill in 

 Sonoma County, and appreciated the durable qualities of this timber. 



The redwood varies in density, the heaviest bo-ng of a dark red color, and the lighter 

 in weight being lightest in tint. Its average weight is 4^ pounds to the square foot. One 

 instance was observed in which the timber sawed from a gulch weighed but 2^ jiounds 

 to the foot, while that from another, but a quarter of a mile off, parallel and leading 

 into the same main caiion, was 6 pounds to the foot. 



The trees growing on a gravelly soil are generally unsound on the top and in the 

 heart, rotting from the top downward. When the tree stands on ground where the 

 nnderlying rock is of a shelly or broken nature the timber is apt to be unsound. Upon 

 precisely the same kind of soil, when the underlying strata are solid, the wood will be 

 solid. The best timber is, of course, along alluvial river-bottoms, which rest upon a 

 Bolid sandstone formation, though a good deal of hill-side timber when the rock is solid 

 "will make the best of lumber. — Sonoma Democrat. 



