TIMBER AND RECREATION 141 



commercial eagerness to forget wage standards, which forces chambers of 

 commerce to forget taxes; to forget almost anything except a dire need to 

 attract tourists, industries, and pay rolls; and to go industrial full-tilt — these 

 southern agrarians really have something to worry about in the recent ex- 

 pansion of the South's paper industry. So have State and Federal forest 

 administrators, from ranger to Chief of the United States Forest Service, 

 from fire warden to State forester. 



In all the Southern States together, 18 new pulp and paper mills were 

 established or projected between January 1, 1936, and June 1, 1939. These 

 made a total of 51. These mills alone may require 4 to 5 million cords of 

 rough wood annually. But even though annual forest growth in the South 

 of all species and all sizes exceeds total annual drain by 7 million cords, 

 the picture is none too rosy. Old-growth and saw-timber stands are in 

 general understocked. But from analyses made in many forest-survey units 

 of some 6 to 10 million acres each, it is known that forest growing stock in 

 the South generally can be built up; that annual increment can be doubled, 

 at least. 



Nature, prodigal as she is, must be aided by man before southern 

 forests as a whole can double their present growth. Fortunately, most of 

 the things man must do are obvious and rather simple. Adequate fire pro- 

 tection must be provided. The forest must be cropped rather than mined. 

 Growing stock must be built up. And these things must be done on all 

 forest lands, no matter who owns them. 



Among the new concerns that have come in so rapidly to take southern 

 pulpwood some are following admirable forestry methods, but many 

 others are not. Certain of the larger companies have made hopeful starts 

 toward sustained-forest use, but others exhibit again, in varying measure, 

 the same reckless methods by which so many million acres of forest land 

 have been laid waste. Unless such companies or corporations, including 

 sawmills and other forest industries, can be brought to see the waste and 

 suffering they are creating, and quickly, it may be for great stretches of the 

 Southland the same old story repeated; and this time it may be an even 

 sadder story. 



If, on the other hand, these industries are developed on the basis of 



