PLAN OF REGIONAL DESCRIPTIONS. 31 



range on any unenclosed land, and farmers have to pro- 

 tect their crops and yards from them by fences. Where 

 farms are in the majority the stock law or "no-fence 

 law" prevails, the stock being kept within enclosures and 

 the fields therefore not requiring fences.* 



In each regional description the present status of the 

 stock law, as determined from newspaper items and soil 

 survey reports, interviews with students and citizens, 

 and observations made in traveling through the various 

 regions, is summed up in a few words, as accurately as 

 the information at hand permits. 



Forest products. — The lists of the principal forest 

 products of each region are derived from personal ob- 

 servation, interviews, and examination of available lit- 

 erature; and the various item.s in each list are arranged 

 approximately in order of value of total output. Com- 

 pleteness of such data is of course out of the question, 

 but they are probably just about as nearly complete for 

 one region as for another. 



In deciding just what to include under the designation 

 of forest products only articles made from native trees 

 and sold, either in local markets or for export, are con- 

 sidered. This excludes two extremes ; first, such articles 

 as buggies, show-cases, furniture and cotton gins, made 

 in towns and cities from wood largely imported from 

 other regions, states or countries; and second, articles 

 produced strictly for home use, such as the fuel, fence 

 rails and posts, axe-handles, cotton baskets, etc., which 

 almost every farmer gets from his own woods. Stove- 



*In the last ten years or so, since attention has been drawn to 

 the importance and feasibility of eradicating the cattle-tick in the 

 South, some agricultural editors have been urging the substitution 

 of state-wide stock laws for the present local option system, be- 

 cause tick eradication is much easier where cattle are confined 

 than it is on open ranges. But a stock law would be unfair to per- 

 sons of limited means who are raising cattle and hogs in thinly- 

 settled counties, for it would deprive them of the use of the abun- 

 dant natural pasturage. It might however be a good idea to have 

 a state-wide law for a few years (just as certain species of game 

 are sometimes protected for a few years in certain states), with 

 the understanding that the present system would be restored after 

 the extermination of the ticks. It might also be desirable to im- 

 pose greater restrictions on hogs than on cattle, since the former 

 seem to be more destructive. 



