February 3, 1897.] 



Garden and Forest. 



4i 



GARDEN AND FOREST. 



PUBLISHED WEEKLY BY 



THE GARDEN AND FOREST PUBLISHING CO. 



Office: Tribune Building, New York. 



Conducted by Professor C. S. Sargent. 



ENTERED AS SECOND-CLASS MATTER AT THE POST-OFFICE AT NEW YORK, N. Y. 



NEW YORK, WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 1897. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



PAGE. 



Editorial Article : — The Redwoods — a Suggestion 41 



The Height of the Redwood (Sequoia sempervirens) C. 5. S. 42 



Notes of Mexican Travel. — XII C. G. Pringle. 42 



Lilium Humboldtii and Allied Species Carl Purdy. 43 



New or Little-known Plants: — Tillandsia Dugesii. (With figure.) 



Mtrritt L. Fernald. 44 



Foreign Correspondence: — London Letter W. Watson. 44 



Cultural Department:— Close Root-pruning for Trees J. Troop. 46 



The Hellebores E. O. Orpet. 4" 



Pandanus William Scott. 47 



Onions W. N. Craig. 47 



Correspondence: — The Choke Cherry in Cultivation... Professor Fred W. Card. 17 



Notes on the Hybrid of Maize and Teosinlhe Dr. J. W. Harshberger. 4S 



Meetings of Societies: — The Nebraska State Horticultural Society 18 



R ecent Publications 49 



Notes 49 



Illustration : — Tillandsia Dugesii, Fig. 7 45 



The Redwoods- 



-a Suggestion. 



EVERY one who knows California knows the beauty of 

 the Redwood forest and the value of Redwood lum- 

 ber, and all Americans should know that the Redwood 

 forest is the richest and most important coniferous forest in 

 the world. It stretches in a maritime belt from the borders 

 of Oregon on the north for several hundred miles south- 

 ward to the southern confines of Monterey County, Califor- 

 nia. It is not wide, as the Redwood does not flourish 

 beyond the influences of sea-fogs or ascend to greater 

 altitudes than 3,000 feet. It is unusual, therefore, to find 

 these trees more than thirty miles from the coast ; and they 

 grow to the greatest perfection on the banks of streams and 

 the slopes of low canons facing the sea. Sometimes, espe- 

 cially at the north, the Redwoods form pure forests, their 

 tall shafts standing close together in such dense phalanxes 

 that only Ferns can grow in the perpetual shadow of their 

 spire-like heads ; and sometimes they are mingled with 

 Spruces, Firs and Cedars in more open forests which are 

 the favorite home of the Tan Bark Oak. No other forest 

 of conifers is so sublime, and no other forest is so pro- 

 ductive. The productiveness of these forests is almost 

 incredible. Fifty thousand feet, board measure, of lumber 

 have been frequently cut from one Redwood trunk, and 

 single acres have produced 1,000,000 feet of lumber, or the 

 yield of some 250 acres of the rich pineries of the south- 

 Atlantic and Gulf states. 



Surpassed in bulk of stem only by the Sequoia of the 

 Sierras and in height * by some of the Australian Eucalypti, 

 the Redwood is without a rival in stately beauty ; and the 

 Redwood forest is one of the wonders of the world, and 

 man in his short-sightedness is going to destroy it. Red- 

 wood lumber, which is the best building material in the 

 Pacific states, is valuable for innumerable purposes, and 

 the Redwood forests are melting away as fast as human 

 energy, aided by steam and the most perfect machinery, 

 can destroy them. Already this wonder of the world, this 

 great national possession, has passed from the control of 

 the Government into the hands of lumbermen and specula- 

 tors, and the story of this transaction is not always a 



*See page 42 of this issue. 



pleasant one. The title to land covered with Redwood 

 trees has sometimes been acquired honestly, but a con- 

 siderable part of this great timber belt has undoubtedly 

 been stolen from the Government by means of dishonest 

 entries, made possible by the defective and foolish land 

 laws of the United States and the dishonesty of its civil 

 officers ; and now it is impossible to find between Smith 

 River and Punta Gorda a single entire section of Redwood 

 forest controlled by the Government. Nor has the Gov- 

 ernment secured anything like a fair money value for this 

 priceless possession, Redwood land having all been sold at 

 prices varying from $1.50 to $2. 50 an acre ; and the nation's 

 loss from its bad management of this narrow stretch of the 

 public domain alone cannot be less than $100,000,000. 

 Fortunately, there still remain in the hands of lumbermen 

 vast stores of Redwood timber, and, unless the construction 

 of a ship canal across the Isthmus widens the demand for 

 Redwood lumber in the eastern states and Europe, many 

 years will pass before the Redwood forests are finally 

 destroyed. The Redwood, too, is fortunately possessed of 

 a surprising vitality which enables it to keep up a brave 

 fight against its human enemies. Cut down it springs up 

 again with many vigorous shoots from the stump, and 

 some of these shoots from trees cut near San Francisco 

 forty years ago are already a hundred feet high and promise 

 to grow to a great size. The fires which lumbermen set to 

 clear away the debris of branches and bark before they are 

 able to cut the trunks into lengths suitable for handlings, 

 carry desolation in their path, but do not destroy the vitality 

 of the Redwood stumps, which, before a year has passed, 

 are clothed with vigorous shoots. These first operations of 

 the lumberman, reckless and extravagant as they are, do 

 not utterly destroy the forest, which, if it could now be left 

 to itself, would in time recuperate. But the land which 

 bears these great trees will produce crops of grass, and 

 this stretch of the California coast is the best dairy 

 region in the state, so that when the logs have been 

 hauled away to the mill, the ground between the stumps 

 is usually roughly plowed and planted with Grass seed ; 

 every Redwood shoot is destroyed as fast as it appears, 

 and at the end of three or four years the reproductive power 

 of the roots is destroyed. 



As we have said already, the supply of Redwood lumber 

 is so great that, under existing conditions, it will last for 

 many years, but this forest is the property of individuals 

 who have acquired it for what they can make out of it. Its 

 length of life, therefore, will be dependent on the exigen- 

 cies of commerce. For purposes of local taxation, land 

 covered with Redwood is valued at something like its 

 market value, and to save the payment of these taxes 

 timber is sacrificed in a ruinous competition which destroys 

 without adequate return. It must be evident, then, that 

 the Redwood forest in its primeval splendor is doomed, 

 and that, sooner or later, the time will come when it will be 

 represented by only a few tattered remnants of its former 

 glory. With it will pass one of the marvels of the world 

 as stupendous in its way as any of the scenic wonders 

 which Americans now count among their great treasures. 

 The wisdom of the nation has set aside for all time a great 

 stretch of the Sequoias of the Sierras that future generations 

 of men may know these trees, but no provision has been 

 made for preserving any part of tin- Redwood forest for a 

 similar purpose, although one Sequoia forest is as impor- 

 tant and interesting as the other, and both are equally 

 wonders of vegetable life. Twenty-five years ago, before 

 lumbermen had learned the value and location of these 

 forests, and the ease with which they could be secured. 

 Congress, without expending a dollar, might have made a 

 great national Redwood park in which all the beauties of 

 this forest might have been preserved forever, but this op- 

 portunity is lost. The expenditure at this time, however, of 

 half a million dollars, either by the nation, the state of Cali- 

 fornia or by some rich man or group of rich men anxious 

 to do a great public service, would even now buy enough 

 Redwood-covered land somewhere north ofCapeMende- 



