INCENSE CEDAR. 9 



bilities of incense cedar as a pulpwood. These experiments 1 show 

 that a fairly good grade of paper can be made from it, although 

 somewhat dark in color and difficult to bleach. The available supply, 

 however, in comparison with the more desirable pulpwood species, is 

 too limited to admit of its ever assuming commercial importance for 

 this purpose. 



Among the miscellaneous uses for incense cedar is the use of the 

 bark as a top dressing for dirt roads subject to heavy traffic. This 

 is common in the vicinity of logging operations, where heavy haul- 

 ing is necessarjT-. The tough, stringy bark serves admirably to 

 keep down the dust and reduce the wear and tear on the road. It 

 also serves excellently as a binder where the ground is soft and 

 springy. The bark, which somewhat resembles that of redwood, 

 has also been used in the manufacture of souvenirs and novelties, 

 although not on a commercial scale. Attempts have also been made 

 .to utilize it in the manufacture of matches, but it was found to be 

 too brittle. 



AVAILABLE SUPPLY. 



COMMERCIAL RANGE AND OCCURRENCE. 



The commercial range of incense cedar is confined to the west slope 

 of the Sierra Nevadas and the mountains of northern California and 

 southern Oregon, although the tree occurs throughout the mountains 

 of the Pacific coast from central Oregon to northern Mexico. It is 

 found only in mixture with other species, chiefly yellow pine, sugar 

 pine, Douglas fir, and white fir, averaging in general about 8 per 

 cent of the stand. Throughout most of its range a cut of 2,000 feet 

 per acre is a fair average, but in localities particularly favorable to 

 its growth it frequently runs from 4,000 to 7,000 feet to the acre and 

 forms as much as 18 per cent of the merchantable timber. Cuts of 

 from 13,000 to 20,000 feet to the acre have been reported on limited 

 areas where it formed from 30 to 50 per cent of the total stand, but 

 they are unusual. These variations in the proportion of incense 

 cedar in the stand, as well as the stand per acre, are characteristic 

 throughout its entire range, but in the southern Sierras, where the 

 conditions for its growth are most favorable, the average stands are 

 generally heavier and the maximum occurs more frequently. This is 

 brought out by a comparison of the average proportion of incense 

 cedar in the stand and the average stands per acre in different re- 

 gions. For example, in northern California the average stand per 

 acre is only about 500 feet, 4 or 5 per cent of the total stand ; but in 

 the southern Sierras it averages from 18 to 25 per cent and runs from 

 2,500 to 7,000 feet per acre. 



1 For the results of these tests see " Paper Pulp from Various Forest Woods," Forest 

 Products Laboratory Series, U. S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service. Issued 

 Mar. 7, 1912. 



11919°— IS— Bull. 604 2 



