128 ANNUAL REPORT OF 



from the side of the county ; further, in the unwieldiness of for- 

 estry as a business — a quality which does not allow of speculation, 

 of unexpected gains and of ready salle — in the large size of the 

 areas required for proper forest management, in the impossibility 

 of entailing forest property, in the state laws preventing corpora- 

 tions from controlling over 5,000 acres of land, in the length of 

 time required to develop a tree out of a seedling, in the uncertainty 

 of future yields, due to an absolute lack of statistics, and many 

 other particularities of forestry which it would lead me too far to 

 enumerate. 



Private individuals, I am confident, will not embark in forestry 

 unless considerable inducements are offered. These inducements 

 must do away with the main obstacles to conservative forestry 

 — preeminently with the danger from fire. The forestry problem 

 of Minnesota is almost identical with the forest fire problem. . If 

 there were no fires, a second growth would invariably follow the 

 removal of the virgin growth, even against the wish of the land 

 owner. As long as fires prevail, desolate barrenness takes posses- 

 sion of the land after lumbering. Hundreds of thousands of acres 

 lying idle in every state of the wooded, east and west — in Minne- 

 sota over 2,000,000 acres- — bear witness to the truth of the state- 

 ment. 



The American people commit a great economic mistake when 

 considering land as unproductive which is unfit for agriculture. 

 On an average, the annual production of' timber on an acte of 

 forest land is about 160 feet board measure, worth standing on the 

 ground about 40 cents. 



THE WAGE EARNER AND FORESTRY. 



Even if protection from fire should cost all of these 40 cents, 

 the people will make a gain : 160 feet of lumber, when manufac- 

 tured into ceiling, siding, sheathing, flooring, doors, boxes, furni- 

 ture, carriages, paper pulp, etc., are worth at least ^4.00, the dif- 

 ference of $3.60 consisting almost entirely of wages earned by 

 manual labor. We lose one of the best chances for remunerative 

 employment, of labor if we allow forest land to go toiwaste. In 

 semi-agricultural districts, where work is scarce during winter, 

 this fact weighs doubly, and similar considerations hold good for 

 certain mining districts where operations are discontinued during 

 the c61d weather. 



If 2,000,000 acres of forest land in Minnesota are lying unpro- 

 ductive, the state loses annually a chance for ^8,000,000 worth of 



