26o FORESTRY IN NEW ENGLAND 



together or when collected into piles in order to clear roadways 

 for hauling to skidways, the piles are lower and occupy less room. 

 They will come in contact with the ground more readily, retain 

 the moisture more persistently and decay more rapidly. This 

 shortens the time necessary to guard against fire and in case a 

 fire gets started, the brush being lower, the fire is nearer the 

 ground, men can approach it more closely, and it is less liable to 

 communicate with the crowns of the trees and start a crown fire 

 than it is when the piles are higher." 



The lopping should be done at the same time as the logging 

 in order to secure the cheapest results. Where done at this time 

 the average cost should not exceed ten cents per cord of pulpwood 

 cut, or fifteen cents per thousand feet of lumber. Oftentimes 

 lopping results in an additional profit instead of an expense, be- 

 cause when lopping is done the loggers are apt to take a longer 

 total length out of the tree and thus secure more timber for a 

 comparatively small outlay. Pulpwood especially might be taken 

 to smaller sizes than at present. With the ordinary mechanical 

 process of rossing (removing) the bark to prepare the wood for 

 the manufacture of pulp, sticks much less than four inches in 

 diameter are wasted. If, however, newer processes of removing 

 the bark, with the aid of water or steam, are employed, it should 

 be possible to use sticks considerably under three inches in diam- 

 eter. Cutting to a diameter limit of one inch less in the tops 

 would mean that the tops left in the woods would be much 

 smaller. 



In a heavy cutting where the tops have to be thrown aside 

 for roadways, the lopping may make the tops so much easier to 

 handle that a saving is effected. 



Lopping is not recommended for hardwoods, since hardwood 

 tops rot much sooner than those of conifers. 



The piling and burning of brush is often recommended as the 

 best way to dispose of inflammable debris. This method is, 

 however, wholly unsuited for use in the spruce region. There is 

 too much young growth and reproduction on the ground which 

 will be injured in burning the piles of brush. The ground actu- 



