PRESJSNT CONDITIONS. 13 



body of pine occurred and has been removed. On the lighter, 

 gravelly loam and sandy loam soils, where the pine formed a 

 heavier admixture, the remaining hemlock and hardwoods are 

 badly damaged and often entirely killed over extensive tracts. 

 (Parts of Price, Chippewa, Sawyer, Washburn counties.) In 

 most of the piaery areas proper, the repeated fires have largely 

 cleared the lands of all the heavier debris in slashings. (Oneida, 

 Marinette, Washburn counties, near Lake Superior at Ashland 

 and Bayfield and in Douglas counties.) Here are large tracts of 

 bare wastes, "stump prairies," where the ground is sparsely cov- 

 ered with weeds and grass, sweet fern, and a few scattering 

 runty bushes of scrub oak, aspen, and white birch. These al- 

 ternate with thickets of small pine (often jack pine) which in 

 spite of repeated fires have escaped destruction or have re-estab- 

 lished themselves. Nor have these changes beeen restricted to 

 the upland forests. The swamps, too, of every county have suf- 

 fered from fires. Some of the worst forest fires have started in 

 the dense tamarack and cedar swamps of the sandy areas, where 

 the most complete destruction has taken place. (Oneida, Price, 

 Chippewa, Marinette counties.) 



In the accompanying map an attempt is made to show the 

 present forest conditions as well as to give some notion of the 

 former extent and character of these woods. The areas of pia- 

 ery proper, distinguished by red color, represent the pine forests 

 of almost pure growth, without merchantable hardwoods and 

 hemlock, covering the sandy districts of this region. The island 

 tracts of mixed forest on heavier soil are not shown and in the 

 same way the numerous small tracts of regular pinery scattered 

 through the great body of mixed forest, particularly along the 

 rivers, were left out for sake of clearness and partly because 

 their exact limits were not ascertained. The hardwood mixed 

 forest, distinguished by gTeen color in three shades, to indicate 

 differences of density or yield, is divided by a red liae into two 

 parts, the hemlock and birch area on the north and east of this 

 line and the oak woods west and south. 



The existence of pine is indicated by red signs, the plus sign 



