THE FOREST AS A RESOURCE. 43 



The virgin forest is always stocked largely with 

 very old, and necessarily often decaying trees, 

 which are doing little or nothing in the way of 

 growth or else are deteriorating faster in quality 

 than they increase in quantity ; then there are 

 myriads of saplings and small brush either of kinds 

 which are undesirable or of individual trees which 

 under the shade of the older will never have oppor- 

 tunity to develop into valuable wood. Moreover, 

 the virgin forest rarely covers fully the ground it 

 occupies, but usually leaves larger or smaller open- 

 ings growing to grass or shrubs, and among the 

 trees forming the forest there are a large number 

 which are not useful in the arts, — tree weeds. 



In addition dead trees and fallen timber always 

 occupy considerable space which is thus withdrawn 

 from wood production. Hence it is almost impos- 

 sible to give even an approximate estimate of what 

 the virgin forest actually produces, how much per 

 acre and year grows in it. 



This is certain, that while the few trees which 

 overtower the general level of the rest of the 

 growth and are fully developed, may have made 

 as much wood as the species in the soil and climate 

 could make, yet the useful wood production on the 

 whole acre has been far below its capacity. 



The timber in our pineries which is considered 

 fit for sawing is mostly over one hundred and fifty 

 years old, and it has, therefore, taken at least a 

 century and a half to produce the five to ten thou- 



