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The Woodlot for Central Indiana. 



By E. C. Pegg and M. B. Thomas. 



INTRODUCTION. 



The purpose of this paper is to show as accurately as possible with the 

 information at hand the conditions of central Indiana woodlots and to 

 make suggestions for their improvement and perpetuation. 



A SHORT HISTORY OF INDIANA'S FORESTS. 



Early explorers of Indiana found a wilderness of giant trees. Upon 

 the tops of hills and higher ground were such trees as beech, hickory, oak, 

 hard maple, walnut, ash and tulip ; in the richer lowlands were the elms, 

 buckeye, basswood and soft maples; and tall sycamores and overhanging 

 willows lined the banks of the streams. It was not uncommon to find 

 trees nearly two hundred feet in height and twenty to twenty-five feet in 

 circumference. Everywhere smaller trees, shrubs and herbaceous plants 

 struggled for their requisite amounts of sunlight. A spongy mass of forest 

 litter made a floor that held rainfall and fed the innumerable springs, 

 which in their turn supplied the streams and rivers with a constant and 

 uniform volume. Such was the unbroken forest. 



Clearing. — It was soon discovered that Indiana's soil was well adapted 

 to agriculture. The early settlers began the work of forest destruction by 

 clearing their homesteads for agricultural purposes. Regular log-rollings 

 were held at which tree after tree was cut down, piled in log heaps and 

 burned. Such work at that time was justifiable because timber was very 

 plentiful and because the ground thus cleared was necessary to furnish 

 a living for the ever increasing population. 



Lumbering. — For this reason much of the land was cleared. Official 

 records, which begin in 1S70, show an acreage of 7,189,334 acres in tim- 

 bered lands. In 1880 only 4,335,000 acres were left. As Indiana became 

 more thickly settled, better houses, cities, roads, railroads and factories 

 were being built, each requiring a certain amount of timber for construc- 

 tion. And in additional ways the consumption steadily increased. The 

 towns and cities afforded market places, the roads and railroads a means 

 of transportation for lumber. Thus began the other chief influence in 



