THE THEORY AND PRACTICE OF WORKING PLANS 227 



outside without an adequate understanding of the silvicultural 

 and economic conditions. It was a precocious attempt to make 

 a plan on European models without the basis of exact knowl- 

 edge which is the fruit of decades of European experience. 



The plans, as such, were valuable chiefly for the estimates, 

 maps, and other field data which they furnished to the owner, 

 and for the volume, growth, and other silvical data which they 

 furnished to the Bureau, together with a splendid field training 

 for the men concerned in the work. 



It is doubtful if any of the plans were ever maintained; for 

 no adequate provisions were made for their control and revision 

 and, though drawn up for decades in advance, they soon lapsed 

 into desuetude. 



Some were published as bulletins of the Bureau, and are 

 now chiefly valuable for the volume and growth tables, and 

 other silvical data which they contain, and as landmarks of the 

 progress toward an American forest management. 



SECTION TWO 



RECONNAISSANCE 



On February i, 1905, the Forest Service of the Department 

 of Agriculture took over the charge of the then forest reserves. 

 The tremendous task of organizing the administrative machinery 

 over an area of over 100 milHon acres absorbed all the energies 

 of the forest service, and although the need of working plans 

 was repeatedly recognized by those in authority and a few 

 sporadic plans were actually made,* nothing systematic was 



* For the details of this development see article " The New Reconnaissance, 

 Working Plans that Work," in Proceedings Soc. Am. Foresters, Vol. IV. No. i. 

 Reprinted Yale Publishing Association, 1909. See also " W^orking Plans: Past 

 History, Present Situation, and Future Development," by Barrington Moore, 

 Proc. Soc. Am. Foresters, Vol. X, No. 3, pp. 217-258, especially pp. 224-232. 



