LOGGING PRACTICE IN THE LAKE STATES 59 
PARTIAL CUTTING IN WHITE-CEDAR STANDS AND OTHER MIXED SWAMP FORESTS 
When white cedar grows mixed with spruce it should be handled 
in the same way as black spruce. No cedar trees that would not 
make 5-inch by 20-foot poles should be cut. Thinning out of cedar 
stands would benefit the remaining stand to a large degree, much 
more than in spruce. For this reason, partial cutting of only the 
largest trees is desirable. Where there is not enough big cedar to 
warrant taking it out without cutting the small cedar, the forest 
should not be cut. 
The same methods that apply to white cedar mixed with spruce 
are also applicable to other mixed swamp forests. 
CUTTING OF TAMARACK 
Most of the merchantable tamarack in the Lake States is dead and 
offers no problem in management. All merchantable dead trees 
should be marketed as soon as possible. Many of them, in spite of 
the fact that they have now been dead for many years, are still 
sound and merchantable for ties, pulpwood, and firewood. There is 
a large quantity of young tamarack coming up in the swamp forests. 
The tamarack is the fastest growing tree of the northern swamps. 
No living tamarack trees, therefore, should be cut at present except 
where thinning is necessary to benefit the growth of the remaining 
stand. 
At best, however, swamp forests, except on the better-drained 
lands, do not offer large profits to the private timber owner unless 
the ground and soil conditions are improved by superficial drainage. 
It is doubtful if the region is now ready for such an intensive form 
of forestry as is practiced in Finland, Norway, Sweden, and northern 
European Russia. Experience, in those countries, however, shows 
that such investment in the removal of excess water from swamps is 
a paying proposition in the increased timber growth that results 
from it. 
SLASH DISPOSAL 
In cedar and spruce swamps, whether cut heavily or not, the slash 
may be left flat on the ground unburned, provided that it is removed 
by burning along railroads, logging roads, trails, etc., and that 
wherever practicable a safety zone is burned around the swamp, be- 
tween the dry highland and the swamp. Where spruce in swamps is 
cut clear in strips, the slash should be piled in windrows in the 
cleared strips. These may be left unburned if a fire line is established 
around the swamp. 
PROBABLE YIELDS AND COSTS 
Taking good and bad spruce swamp forests as they come, the land 
after logging can not be expected to produce naturally more than 
about 12 cords in 80 years, or less than one-sixth of a cord per acre 
per year. No other type of forest, however, responds more gener- 
ously to forest management than swamp forests. Improved growth 
in swamp forests can not be obtained without soil improvements, or 
removal of excess water, and can not be accomplished for less than 
from $3 to $5 per acre. With such improvements, the yield of spruce 
in 80 years may be 7,000 board feet of saw-log material and 20 cords 
of pulpwood per acre. 
