26 BULLETIN" 638, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



A much better way to keep forest land productive is to start before 

 the trees are removed. Steps should be taken to put the forest in 

 better condition, and in this way to increase its productive capacity. 

 Above all, however, every precaution should be taken to see that 

 when the original stand is removed, adequate provision is made for 

 a new crop to take its place. Forestry that starts while the trees 

 are still on the ground is neither so difficult nor so costly a business 

 as one that involves reclamation of denuded land. Ordinarily the 

 new crop can be started at little expense by natural reproduction 

 from the trees in the original stand. Even in those comparatively 

 rare cases where planting must be resorted to, the burden is not so 

 great as in the planting of land that has been denuded and aban- 

 doned, since the land is not so overgrown by weeds and brush and 

 since only partial planting is usually necessary. 



Starting the practice of silviculture before the land is denuded is 

 also a prerequisite to the third step necessary to replace timber 

 " mining " by forestry. This step consists in regulating the cutting 

 of the timber on any given unit so that the same amount of material 

 ean be removed year after year; or, in other words, of utilizing the 

 forest only as fast as it grows. It is perfectly possible for any 

 capable forester to do this. The fact that timber is a crop that 

 requires many years to mature is no reason why an approximately 

 equal annual 3 T ield should not be obtained from forest land as well 

 as from farm land. The only difference is that in the case of the 

 timber the crop can not be removed from the same spot every year. 

 Instead, the unit under forest management must be sufficiently large 

 so that it can be divided into the same number of parts as there are 

 years in the period required for the wood crop to reach maturity. 

 One of these parts can then be cut each year, and a new forest started 

 on it and allowed to grow until all the other parts have been cut, 

 when it will again be ready for cutting. This process, of course, can 

 be kept up indefinitely, and a permanent forest community estab- 

 lished for the utilization of the annual cut. 



Where the forest is composed of trees of different ages, so that 

 clear cutting of any given area is not practicable, the general prin- 

 ciples for securing the same yield year after year still hold, although 

 their practical application is not so simple. In this case, scattered 

 trees are selected for cutting. This means that the cutting must 

 cover a larger area each year and that partial cuttings on the same 

 area must be made more often than where the trees are all of ap- 

 proximately the same age. 



The size of the area that is necessary to provide a sufficient annual 

 cut of timber to be profitable will naturally vary more or less in differ- 

 ent parts of the country, according to the rate of growth, market con- 



