30 CANADIAN FORESTRY ASSOCIATION 



THE FORMATION OF SCHOOL SOCIETIES. 



These ideas should be taught to our children, starting in the primary 

 school, so that from childhood the idea inculcated would be to preserve the 

 trees thai? we see around our homes, and to plant new ones on the public high- 

 ways and about our homes. Once we had a day set aside, known as Arbor 

 Day, and on that occasion it was the custom to plant a few trees, but I 

 would like to see the time when it will be the custom for every one of the chil- 

 dren at school to plant a tree and to take care of it as long as he or she 

 remains at school. Those of us who have visited Europe will remember what 

 a sad comparison we make with our dusty, treeless roads as compared with 

 their beautiful shaded avenues. In a great many cities of the European 

 continent the school children plant trees in the manner suggested, and the 

 custom should be adopted here. In France, in the Jura Department, 300,000 

 trees have been planted by school societies. With very little effort even the 

 children can be made to realize the beauty that can be added to our homes 

 by developing the love of sylviculture. 



REFORESTATION. 



In Quebec immense regions have been devasted by fire during the 

 past few years, and other immense regions that have been destroyed by the 

 axe of the woodmen. All these lands should be reforested as far as is possible 



The old policy, which, I am sorry to say, has been followed by the Gov- 

 ernments of most of the Provinces, that of putting up valuable timber limits 

 for sale by auction when the auction was practically only a subtrfuge to permit 

 general speculation, and should be abolished. Let us encourage the work 

 of reforestation by some system of bonusing or exemption from taxation. 

 Handle the forest as a business proposition by the people and for the people. 

 Let us make special studies of our trees by technical men. Let us establish 

 the limits of each reserve, learn the conditions of its topography and soil and 

 find out what it contains. Also let us prepare plans for the cutting of wood 

 suitable for local conditions, and so as to ensure the perpetuation of the 

 exploited areas. 



STUDIES OF THE WOODS. 



We should have technical studies made of our woods, so that we may 

 know their resistance, compression, tension, etc., to the end that we may be 

 in a position to better inform our engineers and architects as to their mechani- 

 cal value. We should also have tests made of our woods for pulping purposes 

 so as to find out a substitute for spruce the day it may disappear ; also have 

 tests made to determine the value of the different woods for pulp and paper 

 -caking, so as to know what is to replace spruce when the supply is exhausted. 



