PRACTICAL ARBORICULTURE 



259 



ities, but to other factors, chief among which has been the small amount of 

 this timber available and the smaller amount of care and trouble involved in 

 getting other timber close to the railway lines, which served as ties. It may 

 be of interest to note a number of authentic cases of long service. Plate XXI 

 shows a section of a Catalpa tie from the lines of the Louisville and Nashville 

 Railway. The section is taken from the part of the tie situated immediately 

 under the rail. This tie had been in actual service for about eighteen years. 

 It will be noted that the wood is perfectly sound, even at the points where the 

 spikes were driven in. The rail wore down the fiber to some extent, but there 

 is absolutely no decay. Plate XXII shows sections of a post from southeast 

 Missouri, which served as a fence post for the St. Louis, Iron Mountain and 

 Southern Railway for twenty-three years, and before that, on the farm of 

 Colonel Deal, at Charleston, Mo., for fifteen years. These examples of 

 remarkable durability might be extended indefinitely. 



"Without doubt, therefore, one may say that for fence posts this wood 

 has no equal ; and in view of the fact that it can be grown so easily, it ought 

 not to require much argument to cause farmers to plant Catalpa wherever it 

 will grow, ^he same is true for telegraph poles. Wherever trees can be 

 grown tall and straight enough, it will be found that they will serve as poles, 

 lasting longer than almost any other class of timber. 



"For ties the same is true as regards lasting quality. There is only one 

 serious objection to this wood for tie purposes, and that is its soft, yielding 

 character. With heavy traffic, ever increasing, this becomes a serious matter. 

 It is believed, however, that proper tie plates will do much to remedy this 

 difficulty. The cutting in of the rail in the tie shown on Plate XXI is, after 

 all, not excessive, when compared with the redwood, for instance. There 

 seems to be no good reason why a proper plate will not prevent excessive 

 rail cutting." 



I would here 'call attention to the fact that all of the sample ties quoted 

 are of old forest growth, which, being softer in all timbers, will not offer the 

 resistance to rail cutting as will young trees grown in open plantations. 



About twenty-five years ago Mr. J. P. Brown, then a civil engineer on 

 the N. O. and N. E. Railroad, became deeply interested in the .subject of the 

 renewal of our forests by the planting and cultivation of trees. Since then, 

 purely from motives of philanthropy, much of his time has been devoted to 

 the study and pursuit of practical methods of forestry. While by no means 

 a man of one idea, his belief in the superiority of the Catalpa tree for economic 

 use and his thorough study of that species has resulted in his becoming gen- 

 erally recognized as the foremost authority upon that particular tree. In his 

 paper read at a meeting of the National Roadmasters' and Maintenance 

 Society, Milwaukee, Wis., September 9, 1902, he has the following to say 

 concerning Catalpa spcciosa as a railway timber tree: 



"i. It is the most rapidly growing tree in America that possesses eco- 

 nomic value. 



"2. A greater quantity of valuable wood may be produced upon a given 

 area in a specified time than from any other Amet'can tree. 



"3. The wood is the most enduring of all our trees. 



