FOREST, FISH AND GAME COMMISSIONER. 97 



Stock furnished by each nursery: 



Saranac Nursery 145,606 



Forest Experiment Station 3 , 000 



Wawbeek Nursery 57,000 



Axton Nursery 46,278 



Total 251,884 



This comparatively small output is due to the fact that the Axton and 

 Wawbeek Nurseries were not re-established until last year (1906), and that 

 the United States Co-operative Nursery is still lying fallow with the excep- 

 tion of the seed beds. 



In addition to the stock described above as available for the spring 

 planting in 1907, there is a much larger quantity of one, two, and three-year 

 old plants which will be ready for the field plantations later on. 



I take this opportunity to recommend the establishment of a nursery 

 for the propagation of hardwood or deciduous species. As we expect to 

 abandon the one at Axton within two years the number of nurseries will 

 not be increased by this proposition. This hardwood nursery should be 

 located in the Catskills, preferably in the valley of the Esopus creek and 

 near some station on the Ulster and Delaware railroad. 



The State has now over 100,000 acres in the Catskill Preserve and these 

 areas will be increased largely each year by further purchases. Some of 

 these lands are sparsely covered with forest growth and can be greatly 

 improved by underplanting with merchantable species, while other portions, 

 consisting in part of abandoned farms or cleared land, should be reforested 

 with nursery stock. We started a nursery in the Catskills four years ago, 

 at a place about two miles from Brown's Station. The site which was 

 selected without consulting the superintendent, was an unfavorable one, 

 on a hill farm, and the gravelly, stony condition of the soil made its operation 

 difficult and expensive. It was abandoned with the intention of selecting 

 a better site somewhere on the fertile bottom land of the Esopus valley, 

 but for lack of funds nothing has been attempted yet to carry out this 

 plan. 



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