276 



WEST VIRGINIA EXPERIMENT STATION. 



bark and wood, resembles the yellow pine, (Pinusechinata,) but 

 the leaves are uniformly three in a single sheath. 



COMMERCIAL PRODUCTS OF PINE. 



In this State the principle product from white and yellow 

 pine is lumber, the latter furnishing, up to twenty years ago, 

 the most desirable flooring material. Both have yielded an 

 immense quanity of riven and sawed shingles, lath, pickets, etc. 



The young growth of all kinds is extensively used in some 

 localities for mine props, and where abundant, yield a consider- 

 able revenue, the pitch and scrub pine being, in some mining 

 regions, the favorite of all for this purpose. All of the pines 

 furnish, while not the best, a large amount of merchantable 

 cord wood for fuel and charcoal. They also yield in the so- 

 called "rich"logs, knots, and stumps, a considerable quantity of 

 tar and pitch. While turpentine is obtained to some extent 

 from the living trees. 



PAST AND PRESENT CONDITION OF THE PINE OF WEST VIRGINIA. 

 ORIGINAL DISTRIBUTION. 



It is evident from available records and present indications 

 that at one time, possibly not later than 250 years ago, the pre- 

 dominating forest ^trees over large areas in the southwestern 

 third of the State, as well as in the southern and eastern sec- 

 tions, were pine, and that the isolated forests, and the groups 

 and individuals of the white, yellow, pitch, scrub, and table 

 mountain pines that we find at present, are living examples 

 and lineal descendents of extensive primitive forests of one or 

 more of the species mentioned. 



That the yellow pine occurred in abundance throughout the 

 southwestern counties, whenever the conditions were favorable 

 tor its growth, there can be no doubt. I can, myself, remem- 

 ber when it was a common and valuable timber tree in my 

 native county Jackson. In fact, an unusually fine specimen 

 of this species attracted my first attention to forestry questions, 

 and was the subject of my first observation on forest tree in- 

 sects. It was some twenty -five years ago^when my grandfather 

 called my attention to a yellow pine tree growing in a western 



