Mar. 1910.] Conditions in Central and Western Kansas. 329 



City, Garden City, and in fact wherever these trees have been 

 planted in the valley, very good results have been recorded. 



The trees in the Dodge City park were planted about twenty 

 years ago. They now stand thirty feet apart and have reached 

 a height of seventy to seventy-five feet with an average diam- 

 eter of eighteen inches at four feet from the ground. Most of 

 them branch low, but they make a very good form for groves 

 for public gatherings. 



Another planting noted about six miles southwest of Gar- 

 field, Pawnee county, about thirty years old, is a most ex- 

 cellent windbreak. The trees are planted in a double row, and 

 in one stretch 225 feet long 77 trees have attained a height of 

 seventy-five feet and a diameter of twelve inches at four feet, 

 and would make very fair logs. 



The ease with which the cottonwood grows from cuttings 

 marked it as the poor man's tree and it was very widely planted 

 by the early settlers. When located near a well or a watering 

 place it always made the most of an occasional watering and 

 produced trees of considerable size in a short time. A few 

 settlers who systematically watered a row of these trees have 

 been rewarded by a rapid growth that in a few years produces 

 fine trees. 



Wherever the soil is moist and somewhat sandy the cotton- 

 wood will make very fair returns, at present prices of lumber. 

 Barrels for apples and sweet potatoes, crates for fruit and 

 vegetables are needed in ever increasing numbers, and cotton- 

 wood lumber must be depended upon to supply a large part of 

 this demand. 



For park plantings the cottonwood should be grown from 

 cuttings in order that the cotton nuisance may be avoided, and 

 as it is the only species that can produce a large tree in a 

 quarter century its value as an ornamental species is not easily 

 overestimated. The cottonwood has been the pioneer tree; 

 even on upland its growth has made the success of longer lived 

 species possible, and on valley soils it has produced shade, fuel 

 and sawlogs in less time than any other species in any locality 

 where freezing weather occurs. It is worthy the regard of 

 every tree lover and deserves a place in song and story not 

 less honorable than the oak. 



