50 REPORT OF THE FOREST COMMITTEE 



eastern United States. Planting by individuals is often a matter of personal 

 interest in such work for the purpose of improving property so that no part of 

 the land is idle, and with no idea on the owner's part that he himself will harvest 

 the timber. He simply sees his property improved and enhanced in value, more 

 easily sold or left in better condition for his children. 



As an investment timber planting by private owners must be considered in 

 connection with the steady appreciation in value of forest products and in the 

 price of land. There are many localities in the Eastern United States where 

 waste lands are remarkably cheap. These are non-agricultural, but with the 

 increase of values for other types of land in the locality the price of these lands 

 is rising. Good roads and transportation by automobile have put extensive areas 

 within reach of larger and smaller cities for country residence. This line of 

 development will continue. Planting on such lands will add distinctively to 

 future sale values. 



The purchase of land by non-resident owners and setting it with forest trees 

 is relatively infrequent. Such planting must be viewed purely from an invest- 

 ment standpoint and ofifers little to the private individual as compared to other 

 business ventures. 



Private Corporations: Corporations, lumber companies and wood working 

 industries which depend upon buying stumpage for their supply and own practi- 

 cally no woodland have no incentive for forest planting. When supplies are 

 exhausted locally the plant is removed to new territory or abandoned. Many 

 of these small corporations are comparatively short lived, and do not wish to 

 invest further capital which cannot be released except after many years. Such 

 companies also may not have capital available for such purposes. 



There are other corporations and small companies that own some timber- 

 land and also buy stumpage to supply their industries. Such corporations have 

 held their own timber for the time being uncut, as a reserve to prolong the 

 supply, cutting only the purchased stumpage. From this stage the idea has 

 developed of buying young woodland and lands where natural growth of the 

 desired species has become well established. A further practical extension in 

 application of this idea in one case has been the purchase of cheap lands suitable 

 for growth of the species needed and the reforesting of them artificially. Such 

 a plan worked out fully where circumstances permit means a continuous supply 

 for the local industry concerned, provided reproduction is secured either naturally 

 or artificially. 



Another class of corporations are those holding a large acreage of forest 

 land. They are permanent in character and the problem before them is how to 

 make certain an annual cut to supply their mills perpetually. The paper and 

 pulp companies in the spruce region of the Northeast exemplify this class. Their 

 problem is one of forest organization. In such cases the viewpoint of forestry 

 is presented, namely, continuous crops of timber from the same land. Natural 

 regeneration will most probably be given first consideration by the employment 

 of. silvicultural methods. Forest planting will supplement natural reproduction, 

 and may also be applied to waste, cut-over lands and burned areas to bring them 

 into productiveness. Forest planting becomes simply a rational part of forest 



