. 
1886,] Causes of Forest Rotation. 855 
timber on the Walker farm, about twelve miles north of Terre 
Haute. Some one had sawed down many of the trees, for some 
purpose, and while waiting for a team I counted the age of the 
trees by the concentric annual rings on the stumps. Notwith- 
standing that their diameters varied trom six to twenty-two 
inches, every one of forty I counted was sixty-four years old, 
Their ages tallied with the date when the fires were suppressed. 
The prevailing young trees in that grove were jack oak, though 
there were a few white oaks, hickories, poplars and black walnuts 
among them, and these were as tall and thrifty as the prevailing 
kind. The prevailing old scattered, stunted trees of that locality 
were white oak, but the young white, oaks showed no lack of 
thrift and vigor in growing by the stumps of their parents. 
In Ohio, on the east side of the Big Miami river and about a 
half mile south of the line betweeen Hamilton and Butler coun- 
tes, Old Major Cilley (a relative of the Cilley who fought a 
duel with Graves, in Jackson’s time) undertook to clear ten acres 
of land on the Miami hills. This was about seventy to ninety 
years ago, Lam not sure as to exact date. He felled the trees 
Ț  Whea in full leaf, and after they were well dried, fired them and 
burned everything clear. The next spring the black locusts 
“Prouted as thick as weeds in a field, wherever the fire had 
For some reason the ground was not plowed, and the 
Soon grew to be valuable timber, as it makes the best of 
and gate-posts. There were a few parent black locust trees 
in the vicinity, but they were by no means the prevailing forest 
tee there. Their seeds resemble an apple seed, are very hard, 
and must undergo a process of scalding, scorching or very hard 
freezing and then have a clear field before they will grow. 
Ss See 
ane ao 
— Hees 
fence 
o Pervious to ordinary weather influences that they may lie 
Soong the forest leaves many years, and when some subsequent 
favorable condition transpires, as the burning of Cilley’s fallen 
~ Sr, they sprout into life and make a locust forest. 
Tn further consideration of Dr. Clevenger’s idea of soil exhaus- 
a, 3S the cause of a change in the kind of timber, I will say 
“t ta all the pine forests I ever saw, the individual pine trees 
showed no more evidence of enfeebiement, as I should expect in 
“se of soil exhaustion, than do the trees of the forests here, 
Where all kinds grow promiscuously together. A few years would 
Their Seeds being small are easily carried by the wind, and are so ` 
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