410 PRACTICAL ARBORICULTURE 
The inferior portions are used for crates where some cheap, rough lumber 
is required. The best barrel hoops are made of elm, being far better than hoop 
poles of young hickory, chestnut, etc. 
Besides, it is an extremely wasteful practice to destroy millions of young 
thrifty trees which, when split, make but two poles each, of five trees to every 
slack barrel made, when one Elm tree will supply enough hoops for a carload of 
barrels, as well as being superior. 
Another important use is for carriage hubs, for which it is well adapted; also 
barrel staves, heads, etc. 
Naturally the Elm prefers a moist, rich location, and it is commonly found 
along the banks of streams. Here the seed, which is small and winged, is blown 
by the winds and carried by the water until it finds lodgement in muddy or moist 
places, soon springing up and making several inches growth the first year. The 
young tree grows quite rapidly, and if planted closely in rows four feet apart, and 
thinned by cutting out from time to time, will make tall, upright trees of consid- 
erable value in two decades, the thinnings being of utility for fuel, hoops and 
other uses. 
Young trees may be purchased very cheaply at the nurseries, but if it is pre- 
ferred to grow them from seed these should be thickly planted in good garden soil 
in rows one foot apart, covered very slightly, and kept free from weeds and grass 
by frequent hoeing. 
It would be well to allow the seedlings to remain in the seed bed two years. 
The Elm is easily transplanted, even when quite large trees. Under no cir- 
cumstances should forest trees of any kind be neglected, for if weeds and grass 
once get a start they absorb the moisture and impoverish the ground, soon chok- 
ing and stunting the young tree. It is far more important that a voung forest 
be well cultivated and kept free from weed growths than it is for an annual crop, 
such as corn, potatoes, etc., because of its greater value and permanence. 
TREES FOR THE PRAIRIES AND SEMI-ARID REGIONS. 
Any portion of our prairies, and a large area in the semi-arid belt, may be 
brought into cultivation and a variety of forest trees grown, if an effort is made 
and proper conditions maintained. 
Because certain plants have not grown wild in such locations is no argument 
to discourage their cultivation; neither is it convincing to say that there is insuf- 
ficient moisture for anything but sage brush and cactus. The prairies are such 
simply and solely on account of the annual prairie fires with which the Indians 
were accustomed to drive the game to points where they could slay them in multi- 
tudes, and frontiersmen have kept up the custom to enable the young grass to 
spring up and afford pasturage for their stock, and, as well, to protect their homes 
from fire which might come unexpectedly. 
This is shown by the fringe of timber and brush along the banks of streams 
and on damp or dry rocky places on which but little wild grass would grow, not 
enough to burn out the growing shrubbery. In damp places and along the bot- 
toms where timber is found, the annual grasses could not be burned. or but 
