NATIONAL COUNCIL OF HORTICULTURE 63 



most valuable of all woods for planting in the central part of the 

 United States, if not the most valuable. 



Mr. Jesse Fell, probably the greatest tree planter of the Mis- 

 sissippi valley, whom some of you probably knew, once gave me a 

 beautifully polished piece of Catalpa speciosa wood, telling me that 

 it had been buried in the ground at Cairo, 111., for 125 years, and 

 also told me of a foot log that had been across a stream in southern 

 Illinois for 65 years, and both of these were seemingly as sound when 

 removed as ever. Mr. Fell also showed me how to distinguish between 

 speciosa seed and that of other varieties. The fuzzy end of the 

 speciosa is spread out the same width as the body of the seed, while 

 the other varieties come to a point and curl up like "a dude's mus- 

 tache," as he expressed it. To convince me of the hardiness of the 

 tree he took a seedling tree in August about three feet in height, 

 with heavy foliage and unripened wood and split it from top to 

 bottom, stating that the cut would heal over by fall ; later he called 

 my attention to it and it had healed perfectly and was a tree with 

 two branches. 



I think that this society could be very helpful in assisting seed- 

 ling growers and planters in securing the genuine speciosa. 



Professor Rane : The great trouble in taking up the problem 

 of forestry seems to be especially with our financiers, because they 

 think it takes so long to get any returns. They seem to think it will be 

 the next generation that will reap the reward of the work. Last 

 winter I had some bills before our General Court in Massachusetts, 

 and one of the men who appeared before the committee was Mr. 

 Augustus Pratt, whose name I believe has been mentioned more or 

 less in some of the publications in the United States Forestry Bureau 

 Report. He said when he was a young man twenty years of age. 

 upon his father's farm were three and one-half acres of land that 

 was used for pasture purposes in which they were driving cows back 

 and forth about a mile from the barn. He suggested to his father 

 that this land be planted to white pine. He did the work himself, 

 planting the seed by dropping three or four in a place. These grew 

 until seven years ago, when he sold the crop at the rate of $5.00 a 

 thousand on the stump and that area netted him at the rate of 50,000 

 feet per acre, which was $250.00. That was on land not adapted to 

 general agricultural purposes, but land on which the brush had to be 

 kept down in order to use it for pasture. He was a man seventy 

 years of age, and he said that if he had waited until the present time 

 the same stumpage would sell at $7.00 instead of $5.00, making 

 therefore a net profit from one yield on the stump of $350.00 per 

 acre. Now that experience can be duplicated over and over again and 

 more particularly when seedlings are grown and are transplanted. 



Speaking of the esthetic side we have in Massachusetts a Forestry 

 Association of some eight hundred members, people that are enthusi- 

 astic and delighted to do almost anything; I think it was Mr. Manning 

 who suggested retaining a few acres of large original standing pines; 

 the people were delighted to buy it up and retain it. But, on the 



