THE PINE INVESTIGATION. 291 



ers of dead timber, I am confident that the good arising from 

 this frank statement of facts more than overbalanced any harm 

 that came from it. 



THE DYING PINE FOREST. 



(Published in Wheelim/ Daily Register May 19, 1892, and in other W. VOL. 

 and Va. papers.} 



The widespread and universal death of pine timber, which has been 

 going on in portions of Hampshire, Hardy, Grant, Pendleton and Mineral 

 counties, West Virginia; Bath, Highland, Augusta and Rockingham coun- 

 ties, Virginia, and also in portions of Maryland during the past two years, 

 has been a very remarkable occurrence, exciting much curiosity and com- 

 ment as to the probable cause. At the present time, the conditions, in 

 the best pine timbered districts in the affected region, is really alarming, 

 for if the trouble continues, there will not be a living pine of any value in 

 all that pine timbered portion of West Virginia and Virginia lying between 

 the Allegheny Range proper and the Blue Ridge, and extending at least 

 120 miles southwest from Maryland, a total area possibly of six thousand 

 square miles. 



Between the 2d and 7th of this month, (May 1892,) I traveled about 140 

 miles through the counties of Hampshire, Hardy, Grant, and Pendleton 

 for the purpose of observing the condition of the pine forests, and to in- 

 vestigate the cause of the trouble. I examined large numbers of the 

 healthy, dying and dead trees, and my conclusions are that their death 

 is caused primarily by the attack of a single species of insect, a bark bee- 

 tle, the scientific name of which is Dendroctonus frontal is, which has, under 

 favorable conditions increased to such great numbers that they attack 

 perfectly healthy trees, and by their operations in and under the bark on 

 the upper portion of the trees, produce a diseased condition, which at- 

 tracts hundreds of other species to their assistance, and the death and 

 destruction of the trees so attacked is inevitable. 



The trouble begins in a healthy forest by one or two insolated trees or 

 groups dying the first year. Countless millions of little beetles breed in 

 these infested trees and emerge through the bark to attack other healthy 

 ones, which die the next year in great numbers, and by the third year, as 

 shown in the southern portion of Pendleton County, the entire forest is 

 killed for miles around. The best and healthiest yellow and pitch pine trees 

 seem to be attacked first ; after which, the trouble extends to the scrub 

 pme, and later to the white pine. 



Flad we known of the trouble when it commenced, possibly the spread 

 could have been prevented, to some extent, by the use of parasites or nat- 

 ural enemies of the destructive insect ; or valuable tracts of timber might 

 have been saved by cutting and burning the first infested. At the pres- 

 ent time, however, it is too late to think of recommending or attempting 

 to apply a remedy. The trouble has extended far beyond all human con- 

 trol, and nearly all of the valuable timber is either dead or dying. There 

 is one thing that can be done, however, to prevent a total loss of the millions 

 of dollars worth of timber now dying ; that is, for the owners to make an 

 earnest effort to convert all the best trees into lumber or square timber 

 within a year after they die. The lumber can be stacked up and saved 

 for any length of time, while the standing trees would be worthless the 

 second year after they die, owing to the large boring grubs and decay. 



While the destruction of the pine timber is a deplorable fact, it is only 

 one of the many resources of the region mentioned. There are yet re- 



