258 PRACTICAL ARBORICULTURE 



It is very interesting to give in this connection an estimate made on an 

 entirely different basis. In the winter of 1900 the owners of the Farlington 

 forest let a contract for the cutting of 125,000 posts. The specifications called 

 for straight posts, 6 l /> feet long, measuring 4 inches in diameter at the top. 

 These were sold at 10 cents each, or altogether $12,500. It was estimated that 

 this cut removed one-tenth of the trees. Had all the timber been sold in that 

 way, the return would be $125,000. However, limiting the posts to a diameter 

 of 4 inches at the top, without utilizing the smaller sizes, made the cut need- 

 lessly wasteful. Thousands of good, straight pieces only a little below the 

 diameter limit were left on the ground to decay. They might easily have been 

 removed and sold as second-class posts at from 5 to 8 cents each ; and had 

 this waste thus been prevented, the returns from the cut would have been 

 sufficiently increased to make the two estimates very nearly equal. 



Numerous tables are here quoted, showing the percentage of sap and 

 heartwood. This shows that the high percentage of heartwood is found even 

 in the very young trees, and that practically it is uninfluenced by the rate of 

 growth. The five-year-old sprouts on Blocks IX, X and XI of the Yaggy 

 plantation have grown very rapidly, yet they show as much heartwood as the 

 slowest-growing trees (Block I) of the Farlington forest. It permits of 

 but one conclusion. In the early growth of the Hardy Catalpa neither age 

 nor rate of growth affects to any great extent the relative amount of heart- 

 wood. It is generally recognized that the sapwood of the Catalpa does not 

 greatly resist decay when used in or on the ground, nor does sapwood of any 

 timber. Numerous instances are known both in the case of young and old 

 timber of the sapwood decaying and leaving the heartwood intact after a few 

 years' usage in the soil. However, since the sapwood forms so small a part 

 of the tree, its decay is of but little importance. The heartwood of both 

 young and old timber shows great longevity in the ground. Bulletin No. 

 108, of the Kansas Experiment Station, shows a photograph of an eight-year- 

 old fence post which had been in the ground constantly for twelve years. 

 The heartwood was still in a perfect state of preservation. Plate XIX shows 

 a section of a fence post which had been in the ground thirty-eight years. 

 The section was taken right at the surface of the ground where decay is 

 always most rapid. Deeper in the ground this post was perfectly solid. This 

 section, it should be explained, was from an old tree which had made very 

 slow growth. 



"There is no longer any question as to the long-lasting of this wood. 

 Engineers who employed the wood in railway construction in southern Illinois 

 and Missouri, many years ago, when the original groves of Catalpa trees were 

 still standing, were well aware of its valuable properties. In an interesting 

 pamphlet Mr. E. E. Barney brought together, in 1878, a large number of 

 letters testifying to the long life of Catalpa wood. These testimonials might 

 be augmented to-day by hundreds of others, but it is not considered necessary 

 to do so here, for no one doubts this fact at this day. Railway engineers used 

 the wood to some extent for ties, but it has never taken a front rank for this 

 purpose. This has been due not so much to any doubts as to its lasting qual- 



