TAX LANDS AND FORESTRY. 75 



Perhaps a piece that I know as well as any is forty acres, about one- 

 half of a mile east, of Blue LaTie that I own. This piece has white 

 and Norway pine sufQcient for a section if it were properly distributed 

 and to give you something of an idea of the size, I will say that a year 

 ago last winter an adjoining owner concluded that the timber was of 

 suflBcient size to make it profitable to come over the line and cut six- 

 teen trees and cut them into logs. 



This land was cut over by the Ferrys in an early day and I pur- 

 chased it solely to see the timber grow. The pine is much more 

 valuable. 



Four years ago I took out |150 worth of oak for ties and about $100 

 worth of pine that I thought best to cut. If the oak that is now on the 

 place was near enough to market so that it would be profitable to cut 

 I am of the opinion that it would cut three thousand cords of wood, 

 besides some white oak ties and a little pine that would be profitable. 

 This piece is only a repetition of very much more in the vicinity, but 

 is more fortunately situated than some, because it has been protected 

 from the fire. 



T am aware that there is considerable cut-over lands that probably 

 have been burned over so much that there are no seeds. I doubt if 

 it will pay at this time to replant these. Much of that land has grown 

 up to June grass and will retard the small trees. 



It is possible that it may be profitable to replant some of these in a 

 small way, but the principal thing is to keep the fire out. 



I am, yours truly, 



Fred J. Eussell. 



Ann Arbor, Mich., March 31, 1908. 



It seems to me that your contention that the capacity of the land 

 to reforest itself without artificial aid is a natural resource of great 

 value, is entirely correct. 



In extensive traveling over the northern part of the Southern Pen- 

 insula, through the pine region, and in the Northern Peninsula, over a 

 great part of the wild lands, I will say that I. have never seen any areas, 

 except in the rock hill country, where the humus has been entirely 

 destroyed by fire, which would not, if protected for sufficient time, 

 and thus kept from burning over, yield marketable timber. I have 

 seen, in Midland county, a good area of second growth pine ready to 

 be cut on land lumbered fifty years ago, which lay immediately adjacent 

 to tracts of exactly the same character with nothing but bushes, pop- 

 lars and scrub oak upon it, because it had been burned over frequently. 

 The standing timber had been protected by the accident of its situa- 

 tion and shows of what the land is capable. 



In various places, in Clare, Crawford and Roscommon counties, the 

 land is now covered with a thrifty growth of three species of pines, 

 from five to twenty-five years of age; these trees have a great potential 

 value, not only as a source of marketable timber in the future, but as 

 nuclei for reseeding the country around them for a considerable dis- 

 stance, as they grow to maturity; a fire sweeping over any part of this 



