FORESTS 



FORESTS 



341 



The portable sawmill has done ijiuch to relieve 

 the market of waste material. It is practicable 

 only where there are several hundred thousand feet 

 to be sawed. It should be a means of securing 

 the highest price, since there is no expense of 

 transporting almost worthless material in the form 

 of sawdust and slab. However, what is waste today- 

 may be a valuable product tomorrow. There is 

 now a market for both chestnut bark and wood for 

 tannin, thus utilizing the whole tree. The tops of 

 the trees not suitable for saw-timber are used by 

 alcohol plants. In some places sawdust is an article 

 of commerce. The discarded tops and butts of 

 white cedar are now collected and made into 

 shingles as far as the condition of the timber per- 

 mits. Half-decayed pine logs and stumps are sawed 

 into four-foot wood and shipped to brick and tile 

 factories, or for use in other industries 

 where wood fuel is preferable to coal. The 

 logs that have lain on the bottom of lakes 

 and streams for a score or more of years, — 

 the remnants of a past harvest, — are now 

 being raised and placed on the market. 



Kinds and grades of timber products. 



"Willows for basketry must be marketed 

 every year, or they become too large and 

 too much branched. The bundles are easily 

 handled and can be loaded on hay-racks like 

 sheaves of grain and hauled to the basket 

 factory or transportation medium. The 

 price to the grower will depend very 

 largely on the quality of crop and prox- 

 imity to the place of manufacture. The 

 whips should be two to eight feet long, all 

 of one season's growth. The marketing of 

 this crop differs from that of most others 

 of its class in that there is only one use to 

 which it is put and only basket factories 

 buy the product. There are at present few 

 .basket factories in the United States, but since 

 nearly all hand work is required the grower could 

 without much outlay establish his own factory and 

 to a large extent control the market for his crop. 



The splint basket mills are less expensive to 

 establish than sawmills and are frequently built at 

 some railway station, where the product can easily 

 be shipped away. The timber is cut into veneers, 

 and all waste is used for fuel to run the machinery. 

 The mills use up the remnants of a stand of tim- 

 ber, as the requirements are so moderate that 

 crooked and knotty timber of many species can be 

 profitably employed. 



The market for small birch, elm, black ash and 

 hickory poles for half-round split hoops has practi- 

 cally passed. There is, however, some demand for 

 hickory and white oak butts, twenty-eight to 

 forty-two inches long and at least four inches in 

 diameter at the small end, for pick and other 

 handles. When trees of these species and others 

 are to be placed on the market, the owners should 

 correspond with the manufacturers of such tools. 

 If these companies can not use the material, they 

 will inform the owner where such materials can 

 be marketed. Small-sized soft-wood trees will find 



most profitable sale for paper pulp in regions 

 where this material is used. Sticks four inches or 

 more in diameter and four feet long bring three 

 to five dollars per cord delivered at the mill. If 

 not used for pulp they will be in demand for fruit 

 packages. Poplar and basswood in eight-foot 

 lengths are most profitably disposed of for porch 

 columns. Hard-woods and some conifers of better 

 class than for basket stuff — straight trees to 

 twenty-four inches in diameter on the stump, — 

 are now profitably disposed of for piling, and the 

 longer and straighter the better. Even such com- 

 mon woods as beech, black ash, maple and tama- 

 rack are now used for this purpose, but are not so 

 good as oak and cedar. 



Second-growth white ash and hickory always 

 find a ready market for handle stuff. Cedar is 



Fig. 487. Harvesting a woodlot of mized hard-woods in soutbern Con- 

 necticut. The quantity of timber removed in a heavy improvement 

 cutting is shown by the piles of wood. Only the post trees of de- 

 sirable species have been left. The original stand was dense. 



easily marketed in any size from posts three inches 

 in diameter at the small end. As this timber is 

 very light, it is often profitable to transport it on 

 water even of small streams. As the tree gener- 

 ally grows in swampy situations, it is best pre- 

 pared for market in winter and transported in 

 spring. It is necessary first to peel the bark with 

 draw knives. Trees large enough for telephone 

 poles command high price. The available quantity 

 is now so small in the East that poles are being 

 shipped from as far west as Idaho to supply 

 eastern markets. 



Chestnut not suitable for poles is now sold for 

 tannin, thus making use of what otherwise might 

 be wasted. 



The uses of trees large enough for sawed lum- 

 ber are very numerous. Chairs, coaches, tables, 

 tanks, beds, boxes, shingles, spokes, floors, frames, 

 and a long list of articles of familiar and common 

 use are examples. 



Hard maple of the best quality should be mar- 

 keted for flooring, but if no mill for its manufac- 

 ture is at hand, it can be used for medium- 

 priced furniture and other commodities, such as 

 shoe lasts, boot-trees and fuel. The intrinsic value 



