FOKEST CONDITIONS IN TENNESSEE. 29 



are dying out, sometimes as a result of changes in drainage con- 

 ditions. The most common species are white, cow, chinquapin, and 

 bur oak, hard maple, ash, walnut, sycamore, elm, buckeye, and but- 

 ternut. 



The scattering bodies of timber on broken land near creeks are 

 composed of about the same species that are included in the pas- 

 tured groves. On the hills and ridges, however, many other hard- 

 woods are represented, including chestnut and other oaks, beech, 

 sugar maple, and hickory. Red cedar is sometimes found in mix- 

 ture with these hardwoods and sometimes in pure groups. It is 

 especially characteristic of thin-soiled, stony, limestone hillsides. 



The abandoned fields show a great variety of tree growth. Sas- 

 safras, persimmon, hickory, patches of black locust, groups of pop- 

 lar on moister situations, and red cedar in dense thickets, or scat- 

 tered singly, may frequently be met with all on the same farm. 



WEST TENNESSEE PLATEAU AND BOTTOM LANDS. 



The country between the Tennessee and Missisippi Rivers may 

 be considered as one forest region, although it includes two physio- 

 graphic divisions and part of a third. The Plateau and Slope lands 

 comprise an area of about 8,850 square miles, and the bottom lands 

 of the Tennessee and Mississippi Rivers nearly 1,500 square miles. 

 The region is mostly under 600 feet in elevation, the uplands ris- 

 ing from 200 to 400 feet above the stream bottoms. The greater 

 part of the region is a low, rolling upland, with a short slope on the 

 Tennessee side, and a long, gentle, westward slope to the bluffs that 

 border the Mississippi bottom lands. The underlying rock seldom 

 outcrops and is covered by a deep mantle of unconsolidated deposits 

 of clay, loam, and sand. The soil of the bottoms is alluvial in ori- 

 gin and of great fertility, although not always available for agri- 

 culture because of insufficient drainage and danger of overflow. 

 The upland soils vary considerably in quality, the more fertile loams 

 covering the western half of the plateau. They are, as a rule, com- 

 pact and wash badly even on very moderate slopes. In addition to 

 the two navigable rivers that bound the region, a network of rail- 

 roads affords good transportation facilities. The farms are mostly 

 small, averaging about 100 acres, while the large holdings are prac- 

 tically confined to portions of the Mississippi bottom lands. 



This is primarily an agricultural country, with cotton as the chief 

 money crop. Lumbering on a large scale is carried on only in the 

 bottom lands of the Mississippi, The principal forest products are 



