January 6, 1897.] 



Garden and Forest. 



9 



well to exercise care in applying the material on young trees, 

 and I would not now advise any application to remain per- 

 manently. 



Rutgers College. 7- B. Smith. 



Recent Publications. 



The Timber Pines of the Southern United Stales. By 

 Charles Mohr, Ph. D. Together with a Discussion of the 

 Structure of their Wood. By Filibert Roth. Washington : 

 Government Printing Office. 



These monographs have been prepared under the direc- 

 tion of Mr. B. E. Fernow, Chief of the Division of Forestry 

 of the United States Department of Agriculture, for the pur- 

 pose of giving a true conception of the " extent, condition 

 and value of the pineries of the south and of the nature, 

 development and characteristics (botanical, silvicultural 

 and technological) of the Pines in that region, with the hope 

 of inducing natural forestry methods in their use and 

 reproduction." This purpose has been well carried out, 

 and the bulletin will take rank among the most instructive 

 publications of the department. 



Dr. Mohr's part of the work consists of about a hun- 

 dred quarto pages, and since he has been a frequent 

 contributor to these columns our readers need not be told 

 how thoroughly he has studied these interesting forests, 

 and how clearly and how carefully he has treated the sub- 

 ject from both scientific and economical points of view. 

 Of course, the greatest part of his work is devoted to the 

 Long-leaved Pine, Pinus palustris, the great timber-tree of 

 the south, which is found in the maritime belt about 125 

 miles wide, sweeping along the coasts of the Atlantic and 

 Gulf from the southern boundary of Virginia to the uplands 

 which border on the Mississippi River bottom. The wood 

 of this Pine is unsurpassed by that of any other -conifer 

 for purposes of construction, and equal to that of almost 

 any timber-tree in economical importance, so that it has 

 always been in great demand for naval architecture, 

 for civil engineering and for all purposes of heavy construc- 

 tion. Both for home use and for export it has been reck- 

 lessly cut, while the manufacture of naval stores from its 

 resin is one of the most largely developed industries of 

 the southern states, as well as one of the most wasteful 

 industries now prosecuted by civilized man. Investiga- 

 tions by the Division of Forestry have shown that the box- 

 ing of a tree does not injure the strength or durability 

 of its heart-wood, but if the tree is left standing, the wound, 

 of course, interferes with healthy growth, while beetles 

 bore their way into its trunk, and spores of fungi find 

 entrance to cause decay. Worse still, the exuded resin so 

 increases the inflammability of the woods that a fire once 

 started soon sweeps over a large area, not only destroying 

 the standing timber, but excluding all hope of new growth. 

 The first plate in this volume, which shows a stretch of this 

 Pine land after the merchantable timber has been removed, 

 presents a scene familiar to every traveler in the coast 

 region. The trees are spindling, scattered, blackened with 

 fire, and this desolated forest makes one of the most 

 depressing landscapes that can be imagined. Throughout 

 the area of nearly a hundred thousand square miles 

 over which the Long-leaved Pine extends, a stupendous 

 amount of timber-wealth still remains, in spite of the im- 

 mense amount of land that has been cleared for agricul- 

 tural purposes, and the large sections from which the good 

 timber has been culled out or the original growth entirely 

 destroyed. But when we remember that the present annual 

 cut will increase as the northern Pine gives out, it is clear that 

 the logger is far outstripping the possibilities of these woods 

 for reproduction, and if the naval store industry is con- 

 tinued in the same profligate way, and the devastation by 

 fire and domestic animals is not arrested, their extermina- 

 tion for all practical purposes is certain. During the earliest 

 part of its development the Long-leaved Pine grows slowly, 

 so that the young trees are easily suppressed by competing 

 species even under the best conditions. Again, it is impa- 

 tient of shade and needs direct sunlight both for germina- 



tion and for growth. Besides this there are only occasional 

 seasons when it seeds abundantly, and if the seed falls in 

 a wet, undrained soil its sprouting power is lost. Left 

 to the ordinary course of nature, then, the Long-leaved 

 Pine would have a small chance of successful reproduction, 

 but when to its ordinary enemies the influence of man is 

 added, we can easily see why its offspring rarely takes the 

 place of the parent tree, even in regions most favorable to 

 its natural renewal. The economic conditions of the present 

 are hardly such as to justify an attempt at artificial refor- 

 estation, but the importance of this valuable timber to the 

 industrial and commercial prosperity of the people of the 

 country which it inhabits ought at least to suggest to the 

 owners that its natural reproduction should be encouraged. 



The Cuban Pine, Pinus heterophylla, has a greater ca- 

 pacity for natural reproduction than the Long-leaved Pine, 

 and it is easier to renew in forest artificially. It grows 

 with greater rapidity ; it furnishes timber of large dimen- 

 sions as good as that of P. palustris, and it yields resin in 

 abundance. On this account, Dr. Mohr concludes that for 

 reforesting the low Pine lands of the southern-coast region, 

 where it is already making an aggressive growth, it is to 

 be preferred not only to any tree within its original habitat, 

 but that it will be useful far beyond the range of its natural 

 distribution. Very interesting, too, is Dr. Mohr's account 

 of the Short-leaved Pine, Pinus echinata, which stands 

 next to P. palustris in the importance of its timber. The 

 wood takes as good a finish, and is more easily worked, 

 being softer and containing less resinous matter than the 

 timber of the Short-leaved Pine, and it is therefore often 

 preferred by the cabinet-maker and house carpenter. For- 

 tunately, too, the tree produces abundant crops of seed 

 almost every year, and it makes a successful struggle with 

 competing trees in the shade or sun, so that it soon takes 

 possession of the soil with a little assistance from the hands 

 of the forester. It is also of great advantage to the farmer 

 because it furnishes him with an easy method of restoring 

 a tree covering to denuded uplands. 



The Loblolly Pine, Pinus teeda, is a tree of more econom- 

 ical importance than was once supposed. It is as ag- 

 gressive a grower on the coast plain as the Short-leaved 

 Pine is on the rolling uplands of the interior. The rapidity 

 with which it colonizes clearings and old fields has given 

 it the common name of Old Field Pine, and the tenacity 

 with which it retains the ground which it has once pos- 

 sessed for its own seedlings, points to its value in forest man- 

 agement. It also produces abundant seeds, it grows rapidly, 

 and although the timber is in some respects inferior to that 

 of the Long-leaved and Cuban Pines, it will probably play 

 quite as important a part in the forestry of the future as will 

 the Short-leaved Pine. 



The Spruce Pine, Pinus glabra, is the only really soft 

 Pine of the southern states. It is the least common of the 

 Pines of this region, never forms extensive forests, and for 

 the most part is scattered among broad-leaved trees, both 

 deciduous and evergreen. It has, however, the great ad- 

 vantage of thriving under shade, and for which purpose it 

 will, no doubt, be largely used by the trained foresters of 

 this region in generations to come. 



The wood of all these trees is similar, not only in appear- 

 ance, but in minute structure, and the characteristics 

 and anatomy of each, as concisely recorded by Dr. Roth, 

 who has charge of the timber physics of the depart- 

 ment, make an extremely interesting paper. The discus- 

 sion of such points as the differences between sap and 

 heart-wood, and between spring and summer wood, 

 and the like, are illustrated by plates of cross-sections, 

 magnified views of resin ducts and other histological 

 details, so that even the general reader can find much to 

 claim his attention. Mr. Fernow contributes an introduc- 

 tion to the whole, in which he sums up the work of Dr. 

 Mohr and Mr. Roth. He offers diagrams to show the 

 comparative growth of average specimens of the different 

 species during a given time, in height, in diameter and in 

 volume, and, altogether, he makes a clear summary of 



