PRACTICAL FOBBSTEY. 29 



ground. When each log comes to the saw there is a further loss of 

 nearly all the slabs and edgings and all the sawdust that is not used 

 for fuel. On the average it is doubtful whether more than half of 

 the cubic contents of a standing tree is finally used. As prices rise 

 and as conservative lumbering comes to be generally practiced, the 

 greater part of this enormous loss will be avoided, but it can probably 

 never cease altogether. 



PLANTING. 



It has often been proposed to plant trees in order to repair the 

 daraage done to the forests by the lumbermen. Tree planting is 

 most useful in all the treeless or scantily wooded portions of our 

 country where planted trees will grow, and wherever forests have been 

 very severely injured or destroyed, but it is generally far too expensive 

 to take the place of conservative lumbering iu regions already forested. 

 An acre of growing natural forest can be bought ia nearly every for- 

 ested part of our country for less than it would cost to plant, 4 feet 

 apart, an acre of seedlings a few inches high. The true way to save 

 the forests is not to plant new ones, but to protect and rightly use 

 those which are standing now. The extension of the forest to regions 

 which are without it is a most important task, but it must not be 

 confounded with the conservative use of the forests now standing. 

 For such use there is no substitute whatever. 



THE WEATHER AND THE STREAMS. 



The central point of public interest in forestry in the United States 

 was until recently the influence of forests on climate. It is natural 

 that the connection between the immense forests and vast plains and 

 the wonderfully various climates of this continent should have 

 awakened attention. It is a matter which is easily written and 

 talked about without any thorough understanding of forestry itself, 

 and in this it differs from other branches of the subject. In dealing 

 with the weather one touches a thing which affects the daily life of 

 everyone, and which, to very many, holds the balance between pov- 

 erty and prosperity. It is therefore unfortunate that so much of the 

 writing and talking upon this branch of forestry has had little definite 

 fact or trustworthy observation behind it. The friends and the 

 enemiesof the forest have both said more than they can prove. Both 

 have tried to establish the truth of their opinions by referring to 

 observations of temperature and rainfall which cover too short a 

 time to prove anything, or by hearsay and general impressions, which 

 are not to be trusted in such matters. Such discussions make nothing 

 clear except that the pith of the matter has not been reached by 

 either party. 



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