FOREST, FISH AND GAME COMMISSIONER. 8 



6 



The plants imported from Germany cost six marks, seventy-five pfen- 

 nig ($j .62 1 per thousand, f. o. b. on steamer at Hamburg, and were entered 

 at New York free of duty. But the ocean freight, express charges from 

 New York, and cartage over the eight miles from Paul Smith's railroad 

 station made an additional expense of $1.03 per thousand. Hence this 

 German stock cost us $2.65 per thousand delivered on the planting grounds, 

 or a little over one-fourth of a cent per tree. The stock bought in Illinois 

 and Wisconsin cost more, so much so that we have discontinued purchases 

 from American nurseries, and will in the future confine our planting to the 

 output of our own nurseries ; or, if that proves insufficient will supplement 

 it with importations from Germany. 



The cost of labor in setting out the plants in the field is $325 per hun- 

 dred thousand, or about one-third of a cent per tree. Two men working 

 eight hours can set out, on an average, about 1,500 plants in a day. So 

 this plantation, or so much of it as is occupied by imported stock cost six- 

 tenths of a cent per tree, including both the purchase or propagation of 

 the seedlings and the labor in setting them out in their final position ; and 

 it may be assumed that the expense per tree of subsequent plantations 

 can be figured on this basis. The cost per acre, however, will depend on 

 the spacing, or number of trees per acre, as will be explained further on. 



That our foresting operations have thus far cost more than these 

 figures indicate is due to the establishment of new nurseries, the high prices 

 which we are obliged to pay for stock from American firms, the expense 

 of filling blanks in two of our plantations, and the minor mistakes or fail- 

 ures incidental to experimental work under new and untried conditions. 



In addition to the 355,000 nursling trees set out on the plantation near 

 Paul Smith's in the spring, there were shipped from the State nurseries 

 193,00c more to the plantations made in the fall of that year at Chub Hill 

 and at Ray Brook, making, in all, 548,000 trees used in our reforesting 

 operations for 1905, not including plants used for filling blanks at other 

 places. 



At Chub Hill we used 65,000 white pines and 50,000 Scotch pines. At 

 Ray Brook we used 61,000 Norway spruce, 5,000 Scotch pine, 5,000 white 

 pine, and 7,000 European larch. The percentage of trees that died in these 

 plantations was much larger than in any of our previous work, and was due, 



