FARM FORESTRY IN THE LAKE STATES PAA 
greater net return of at least $50. But the plan of land use which 
seemed likely to yield the highest income of all was that in which 
the better (20-acre) timber tract was devoted to timber growing ex- 
clusively and the poorer to grazing. With such a combination of 
maximum growth of high-grade timber, and forage production on the 
more accessible 15-acre tract, returns at least $75 larger than at present 
seemed assured. | 
Forest use of farm land has a strong advantage up to the point 
where all home needs of timber are being met and the farmer’s own 
time is fully occupied. Beyond this point, at which it becomes neces- 
sary for the farmer to seek market outlets for his timber and to hire - 
special labor for woods work, two opposite tendencies appear. On 
the one hand, the advantage of forest use is retained well beyond 
the point of self-sufficiency if the farm is large, if there is much land 
of rough topography or otherwise unsuited to uses other than 
forestry, if the farm operator has a personal aptitude for timber 
management, or if timber markets are especially favorable. On the 
other hand, forest use beyond the point of self-sufficiency of land 
suitable for open pasture is relatively disadvantageous on small 
farms, especially those where the dairying enterprise is intensively 
developed. 
Regardless of whether forest or pasture use of land is more 
profitable in any particular case, and to what extent, one fact ap- 
pears to hold true universally—combination of timber production 
and forage production on a single tract of land is inefficient. This 
dual use of land produces neither good timber nor good pasture, the 
trees shading out the grass and the grazing cattle reducing the yield 
of wood. In Carver County, Minn., again, the highest returns from 
woodland are obtained from forage where the timber stocking is 
very hight (less than 1 cord of wood per acre), or from timber yield 
where stocking is more than 30 cords per acre. Returns from wood- 
land which is neither good pasture nor good forest (containing 7 to 
10 cords per acre) are from $3 to $4.75 less per acre than in either 
of the other cases. 
In relation to part-time farming, the role of forestry is far dif- 
ferent. Part-time farms are numerous in the northern part of the 
Lake States, where farm income from all sources averages only 
about half as much as in the southern part. Some 30 percent of the 
farmers in the northern forest belt work outside the farm more than 
a month during each year, and nearly 50 percent obtain part of their 
income by work outside the farm. A considerable number of these 
part-time farmers have as their off-farm occupation either woods 
work or the transportation or milling of forest products. 
Results of a study of the farm-forest situation in the vicinity of 
Littlefork, in northern Minnesota, show how close is this tie between 
agriculture and forestry on northern areas of the Lake States, even 
where agriculture is relatively well developed. The 240 farms 
within the Littlefork area, comprising about 29,000 out of some 213,- 
000 acres, have somewhat better than average soil and yield a slightly 
higher than typical income. The remaining land is in forest and 
largely unsuited to agriculture. Of this the State of Minnesota owns 
about 108,000 acres, large lumber and paper companies own some 40,- 
000 acres, and nonresident small owners own most of the remaining 
36,000. Of the rural families in the Littlefork area about 40 percent 
