Assistance in Handling Forests 



45' 



GOVERNMENT COOPERATION WITH 

 FOREST OWNERS 



Forest lands in private ownership are 

 mainly of two kinds, small holdings, for 

 the most part farmers' woodlots, and 

 larger areas, chiefly valuable for lumber. 

 The Bureau of Forestry is prepared, so 

 far as its appropriations will permit, to 

 lend its aid to the owners of each kind, 

 on receipt of applications stating the 

 situation, area, and character of the for- 

 ests for which working plans are desired. 



Applications will be considered in the 

 order in which they are received, but 

 precedence must be given to the lands 

 most likely to furnish useful examples. 

 A working plan once prepared will not 

 be put in effect unless it is satisfactory 

 to the owner. 



The conditions upon which the De- 

 partment of Agriculture, through the 

 Bureau of Forestry, will undertake in- 

 vestigations and give assistance are 

 stated in the agreement, and provide that 

 a preliminary examination, if necessary, 

 shall be made wholly at the charge of 

 the department, and that if no further 

 st udy is required final recommendations 

 for management shall be made without 

 cost to the owner. Advice, therefore, 

 for those small tracts which do not re- 

 quire detailed study will be given with- 

 out expense to the owner. As further 

 stated, in the agreement, the cost to the 

 owner of working plans for tracts re- 

 quiring detailed study will be based upon 

 the actual cost of the necessary study 

 on the ground, but may be reduced in 

 consideration of the usefulness of the 

 work as an example in practical forestry. 



Tracts of any size, from five acres up, 

 are eligible. 



WOODLOTS 



Throughout a very large portion of 

 the United States nearly every farm has 

 a certain part of its area under wood, 

 either planted, as in regions otherwise 

 treeless, or of natural growth. The 

 value of this wooded portion, besides 

 affording protection from the wind, is 



chiefly for fuel, fencing, and railroad 

 ties, with some building material, and 

 the wood needed for special uses about 

 the farm. Without the woodlot a farm 

 very often would be an unprofitable in- 

 vestment, because the farmer could not 

 afford to buy the wood which now costs 

 him very little except the labor of cut- 

 ting and moving it. Indeed, in very 

 many cases the woodlot keeps the farmer 

 going. His labor there during the win- 

 ter, when otherwise he would be idle, 

 makes up for any deficit in the cultivated 

 land, and the ready money he receives 

 from the sale of fuel, ties, or other ma- 

 terial is indispensable to his comfort and 

 prosperity. 



In two directions, then, material and 

 money, the product of his woodlot is of 

 high importance to the farmer. But in 

 the majority of cases this part of the 

 farm is far less useful than it might 

 easily be made. This is true because 

 the farmer does not study its productive 

 capacity as he does that of his fields and 

 pastures, and hence does not make it 

 yield as freely as he might, with little 

 or no additional labor, if he went about 

 it in the right way. 



TIMBEREANDS 



Large bodies of forest land in almost 

 every wooded portion of this country 

 have come into the hands of private 

 owners, and are held by them chiefly for 

 their value as sources of timber. Much 

 of this land, probably the greater part 

 of it, is in hilly or mountainous regions, 

 where the preservation of the forest is 

 of importance for both wood and water, 

 while the destruction of the lowland 

 forests, except when they give way to 

 agriculture, would bring with it the loss 

 of a plentiful spring of national wealth. 



The harvest of the timber crop on 

 these private timberlands is commonly 

 accompanied, under the usual methods 

 of lumbering, by the destruction of the 

 forest when merchantable trees predom- 

 inate, and in any case by severe and 

 needless injury. Fire follows the lum- 



