A ^tad\ in Practical R^efore^ting. 



Bv J. Y. McCLINTOCK, C. E.* 



AS the New York State Forestry Department is about undertaking the work 

 of reforesting its denuded lands, it was deemed advisable that some definite 

 information should be obtained regarding the forest plantations at various 

 places in the adjoining States, the silvicultural methods there employed, and the 

 facts relating to the success or failure of such efforts. With this end in view I 

 visited different places where forest tree planting had been undertaken, especial 

 attention being given to the plantation on the Stephen Girard estate, situated on 

 the watershed of Lost Creek, Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania. The work carried 

 on there has been pronounced by experts as one of the most interesting and 

 instructive experiments of the kind undertaken in this country ; and so this paper 

 is devoted to the observations made during a personal inspection of that tract. 



I found that a series of plantations, beginning with the year 1881, had been 

 made by Mr. Heber S. Thompson, engineer of the Girard estate. They are located 

 on top of Locust Mountain, at an elevation of 1,600 feet above sea level, and around 

 the artificial reservoirs of the Girardville Water Company, near the village of Lost 

 Creek. In constructing the reservoirs large areas were stripped of material to a 

 depth of several feet, leaving only clayey gravel upon which the small trees have been 

 planted, as well as upon the natural surface. 



The conditions of soil, climate and elevation are similar to those in the Catskill 

 region. The country has been burned over so many times, and is so easily fired, 

 that it will require a strong effort to restrain the large number of people who pick 

 berries over it from keeping it burned down. 



The natural or volunteer growth is good in places, but very irregular. Large 

 areas seem to be permanently occupied by worthless scrub oaks to the exclusion 

 of any other species. Whole mountain sides have been seized and occupied bv 

 mountain laurel, under which it appears impossible for anything else to germinate. 



A section of mountain land containing 1,200 acres was set apart as a forest 

 preserve. On this land the natural growth of young oaks, chestnuts, and pines 

 was protected, and trees were planted. A fire lane, one hundred feet wide, was cut 



*Assis'tant Superintendent State Forests. 



87 



