264 PRACTICAL ARBORICULTURE 



from these rows. I measured one thirty-six inches circumference at butt ; 

 thirty inches six feet up; sixteen feet to the first side branch, which will make 

 a twenty-five foot pole, six inches in diameter. Another growing in single 

 row measured fifty-four inches in circumference at butt; forty-two inches six 

 feet up ; ten feet to first small side branch, which will make a twenty-five-foot 

 pole eight inches in diameter. Another in the same row measured thirty-six 

 inches in circumference twelve feet up. 



Farmers in this region, which is between Mt. Carmel and Albion, 111., 

 appear to fully appreciate the excellence of this wood. One man told me he 

 had recently hauled fence posts twenty miles in order to get Catalpa posts. 

 Thousands of Catalpa posts and rails may be seen on every side, and I did 

 not see one broken rail. This struck me as very singular, having recently 

 come from the long leaf yellow pine region of Georgia, where broken fence 

 rails are very common, indeed. These Illinois farmers have a practice of 

 planting Catalpa trees in single rows bordering their fields, utilizing the living 

 trees for fence posts, cutting back at, say, five feet from the ground, and 

 cultivating the upright sprout from this stump, which in a few years produces 

 a growth large enough to be made into several more posts of ordinary size, 

 thus providing a continuous source of supply directly on the ground. 



In driving along a public highway between Brown's Station and Albion, 

 I noticed a fine row of trees which had evidently been planted with this 

 purpose in view. In the meantime a telephone company had run their lines 

 along this road, attaching the wires to the trees in this row. A row of living 

 telephone poles probably a quarter of a mile or more in length is pretty con- 

 clusive evidence that Catalpa trees do grow straight enough and tall enough 

 to make valuable poles in about fifteen years, if given room enough in which 

 to obtain nourishment from the soil. This row borders a cultivated field on 

 one side and a public highway on the other. It has had no cutting back, no 

 cultivation, the trees standing in fence corners completely surrounded with a 

 heavy sod. The same lack of cultivation is evident with all the farm and 

 street rows I have seen. If trees will grow in this manner in spite of diffi- 

 culties, it seems probable that Me. Brown's method is correct, and that much 

 better results may be anticipated from forest plantations if the young trees 

 are not crowded. 



Enough has already been said regarding the enduring quality of this 

 wood, but some information upon this point which I chanced to obtain when 

 in Edwards County, Illinois, is of so direct a nature that it seems of sufficient 

 interest to be related in this report. In making some small purchases at a 

 store, I learned that the merchant, a Mr. W. L. Wheeler, had served for 

 twenty-two years, first as section foreman and later as supervisor, on what is 

 now the St. Louis Division of the Southern Railway. Mr. Wheeler informed 

 me that when he began service with this company he found thousands of 

 Catalpa ties in the track where they had been since the track was laid, some 

 eight years earlier. He had first laid fifty-two pound rails on these ties. When 

 that was renewed he found many of these ties fit for further service, and laid 

 the new fifty-six pound rail on them. And when renewing recently with 

 seventy-five pound rail, a few were still found serviceable and remain in the 



