Canadian Forestrij Journal, November, 1917 



1397 



More significant, however, has been 

 the striking change in timber vahies, 

 due to the gradual depletion of once 

 abundant tree species and the growth 

 of population and markets. White 

 pine, so prolifically distributed 

 through Ontario, Quebec and New 

 Brunswick — then, as now intrinsically 

 the most valuable wood we have — 

 has been reduced to rather a poor 

 second to spruce and Douglas fir in 

 the total national cut. It is not to 

 be gainsaid that a great deal more 

 white pine has been delivered to fire 

 than has been turned to commercial 

 purpose. Indeed, the estimate of in- 

 vestigators is that two-thirds of the 

 country's original forest inheritance 

 has been the victim of flames. White 

 pine in New Brunswick does not take 

 better than fifth place in the average 

 season's cut. The words of a Quebec 

 lumberman testify to a like condition 

 farther west. "A boom at my fath- 

 er's mill was practically all white 

 pine, and about five or ten per cent, 

 spruce. To-day the proportions have 

 been reversed." Ontario alone main- 

 tains its white pine preponderance 

 year by year. 



Our most valuable hardwoods also 

 have sufTered. Standing as they did 

 on the agricultural soils of southern 

 Quebec and Ontario, the advance 

 of settlement took small account of 

 future market prices for oak, elm, or 

 walnut. We are, as a consequence," 

 importing most of our precious hard- 

 woods to-day from the United States, 

 and the college building or residence 

 of recent construction will as often 

 as not exhibit oak pannelling supplied 

 from Uncle Sam's forests. 



Hemlock, too, has supphed another 

 lesson on the necessity of guarding 

 resources for future values. Hem- 

 lock in Canada had for long years a 

 trifling value as a source of tan 

 bark. As might be expected, the 

 hemlock supplies of the country went 

 the prodigal way of white pine until 

 now operators are offering prices that 

 a few years ago would have seemed 

 quixotic. 



Spruce has become king of the 

 castle. Spruce, white pine, and Doug- 

 las fir account for 75 per cent, of the 



total annual cut, which in 1915 ran 

 to 334 billion feet, board measure, 

 worth $(31,919,806. Hardwoods re- 

 presented only about 6 per cent. 

 Over 3 billion shingles are produced 

 yearly, worth about $6,000,000. 



Forest Wealth by Provinces 



Just as the most important fact 

 in the nickel industry of Canada is 

 the extent of nickel deposits, simi- 

 larly the lumber industry must be 

 viewed in the light of the living for- 

 ests. Canada's timber resources are 

 the third largest in the world, ranking 

 after those of Russia and the United 

 States. The estimated present sup- 

 ply of commercial timber, according 

 to the Dominion Director of For- 

 estry, is 500 to 800 billion feet, not an 

 'inexhaustible' quantity when we con- 

 sider that w^e are using three and a 

 quarter billion feet a year, and with 

 the population of 1950 will probably 

 multiply the annual consumption sev- 

 eral times. The area of 'commercial 

 forest' (not including pulp wood, fire 

 wood, etc., is) reckoned at about 

 250,000,000 acres, or one half the 

 whole forested area of the Dominion. 



British Columbia, with 50 million 

 acres, containing 350 billion feet, 

 board measure, has more large saw 

 timber than any other province. 

 Douglas fir accounted in 1915 for 

 more than two-thirds of the total 

 lumber cut of the province, wdth red 

 cedar, spruce-, yellow pine, larch, etc., 

 varying from 8 per cent, downw^ard. 

 The bulk of the best timber is in the 

 Coast region. 



Alberta has about 5,400,000 acres 

 of commercial saw timber amounting 

 to 21 biUion board feet, spruce form- 

 ing the bulk of the annual cut. Sas- 

 katchewan timber area is 3,584,000 

 acres, the contents of which are about 

 14 billion feet, spruce being the pre- 

 valent commercial wood. In Mani- 

 toba 1,920,000 acres of saw timber 

 contain about 6,850,000 feet of tim- 

 l3er, and of the annual cut of lumber 

 in 1915, spruce formed 93 per cent. 



Ontario, accessible to the richest 

 markets of the continent and endow- 

 ed with excellent transportation fa- 

 cilities from the log to the finished 



