282 PRACTICAL ARBORICULTURE 
Ii rapid growing trees should be planted at once, 222 trees per acre, 
it would require five million acres to grow enough timber for this purpose. 
There is no danger of our planting too much timber, and the farmers 
who begin now and plant a fair proportion of their lands in such timber as 
is in constant demand at high prices, will in due time reap their reward, and it 
will come when they begin to feel like retiring from the arduous labor of 
farm life. 
Of course, if the planting is done and no further interest taken it will 
result in failure just as any other crop would do. 
I shall leave to the great lumber manufacturers and dealers the problem 
of future supply of lumber for the market. Fires, excessive cutting, unwise 
exports at unremunerative prices, competition which is entirely unnecessary, 
waste upon every hand; how long can this continue? 
There is a great benefit to the land from growing forests, its fertility 
is renewed, by the annual deposit of ieaves and decay of twigs and roots. 
Wind carries the leaves to other fields, adding in their fertilization. 
The waste in soil erosion is greatly lessened, and often checked entirely. 
The injurious effects of hot drying winds is largely overcome by heavy 
belts of trees, which guide the air currents above the surface. 
The influence of the trees upon the climate, rainfall and sudden changes 
of temperature is recognized by every intelligent person. 
A forest of economic trees is better than a life insurance policy, for a 
great majority of companies fail after receiving premiums for many years. 
YOUNG GROWTHS ARE OF GREATER VALUE THAN OLD TREES 
The popular impression is that timber lands are without value until the 
trees have obtained great age, yet this is fallacious. 
The oak, for example, is of great longevity; its growth seems slow when 
compared with human existence, and the opinion prevails that a century must 
elapse ere it would have any value. 
For some purposes old wood is necessary, but in general this is far from 
a correct conclusion, as with most of our Northern trees the annual growth 
is made on the outside of the trunk, and just within the liber, or inner bark. 
There is but little connection between the older layers of wood and the grow- 
ing parts, and in a few years it ceases entirely in performing any part of the 
functions of the living tree, except that it aids in stiffening the trunk, and 
supports the active, though flexible young wood. 
In the case of the oak, the heart wood may have been formed and died 
a century or more ago, each successive annular growth or ring being a year 
younger, while the last sap growth is of the present season. 
The wood of such a tree is of far less utility for most important purposes 
than the wood of young trees from a dozen to two score years of quick, live 
growth. 
A giant cedar (thuya gigantea) of Washington, measures 63 feet cir- 
cumference, and is 265 feet in height; it is hollow, having been the abode of 
bears for a great period. The walls now are but four feet in thickness, all the 
