Canadian Forcslrij Journal, March, 1U17 



1021 



Canada's Work in Forest Research 



The Working Programme of the Forest Products Laboratories 



of Grenada, With Description of Some Scientific 



Investigations. 



Brief Excerpts from an Address by W. B. Campbell, Assistant Superintendent 

 Forest Products Laboratories McGill University, Montreal. Delivered 

 Before the Annual Meeting of the Canadian Forestry Association. 



At the present time the necessity 

 of scientific research in industrial 

 work is universally acknowledged but 

 at the same timiC there is an almost 

 universal lack of definite knowledge 

 of what is really meant by industrial 

 scientific research. The fact that 

 the marvellous progress made by 

 Germany in the past twenty-five or 

 thirty years is due most largely to 

 the work of her chemists leads many 

 people to suppose that chemists need 

 only be presented by an industrial 

 problem and they straightway pro- 

 duce the solution in their laboratory. 

 Such a view overlooks the years of 

 patient toil and the hosts of dis- 

 appointments that come to the in- 

 vestigator before he produces tangible 

 results. The research leading to the 

 substitution of artificial indigo for 

 the natural product, for instance, 

 took about twenty years' time of 

 many gifted men and the expenditure 

 of about five millions of dollars before 

 there was any return. Such a case 

 is not at all exceptional and differs 

 Only in degree from many other prob- 

 lems solved by intensive scientific 

 research. 



Many of the investigations now 

 under way at the Forest Products 

 Laboratories are intended only to 

 cover the immediate problem before 

 us but others are designed to proceed 

 until a knowledge of the basic prin- 

 ciples of the subject is obtained. 

 Such, we consider, is the most real 



purpose of our institution. The 

 wood-using industries of our country 

 are not of such size as to warrant 

 their establishing individual labora- 

 tories of this kind and if the Forest 

 Products Laboratories of Canada can 

 furnish to these industries scientific- 

 ally accurate information concerning 

 their materials and products and the 

 manufacture of those products, then 

 we of the laboratories will consider 

 that we have not only earned our 

 salaries but that we have done our 

 little bit to promote the industrial 

 greatness of Canada. 



A very brief mention of a few of 

 the investigations which are now be- 

 ing carried on will suffice to show 

 what we are attempting at present, 

 though we are considerably handi- 

 capped by the absence of some of 

 the best of our staff who are at the 

 front and the impossibility of getting 

 other suitable men at this time. 



Some of the leading investigations 

 now on hand are as follows: — 



A comparative study of the mech- 

 anical strength and physical proper- 

 ties of all Canadian woods. Tests 

 are made on a large number of small 

 clear specimens cut in the same way 

 from several trees of each species 

 selected in the forest by Forestry 

 Branch experts. These tests are be- 

 ing made on the same system as a 

 similar series of tests under way at 

 the United States Forest Products 

 Laboratory so that our results will 

 be directly comparable with theirs. 



