8 PRIVATE FORESTRY. 



wood-working establishments close, subsidiary industries can no 

 longer exist, the population moves away, farms are abandoned, roads 

 and other public improvements deteriorate, and whole townships and 

 even counties are impoverished. A few individuals may have real- 

 ized handsomely from the speculative enterprise. The community 

 has been gutted of its principal capital. It has lost the basis for in- 

 dustry and has now only unproductive land that for many years will 

 be a burden rather than a source of prosperity. This is not an occa- 

 sional occurrence. It is the history of millions of acres of land un- 

 productive and now an economic desert. 



PRIVATE FORESTRY MUST SUPPLEMENT PUBLIC FORESTRY. 



I am advocating a large program of public forests widely dis- 

 tributed throughout the country ; but the solution of the forest prob- 

 lem will not come from public forests alone. Even with the most 

 liberal policy of acquiring additional public forests, the Nation's 

 needs with respect to forests in the future will have to be met in con- 

 siderable part from private lands. We point to the forests of France 

 as having met a great crisis in the war. Do you know that 60 per 

 cent of the American supplies obtained in France came from private 

 forests ? 



You may ask if the increasing interest in forestry of private owners 

 and the operation of State forest laws are not likely to bring greatly 

 changed conditions in the near future. Unfortunately this will not 

 be the case unless a much more comprehensive and effective program 

 is adopted by the public and there is a radical change in point of 

 view and methods on the part of most timberland owners. We should 

 give credit to those individual owners and groups who are endeavor- 

 ing to handle their timberlands constructively. Great credit, too, 

 is due to the State foresters and their supporters for what they have 

 achieved in the face of public indifference and even hostility. But 

 when we consider .our forests as a whole we have hardly begun to 

 stem the tide of forest destruction. Even in the matter of organized 

 fire protection the effort on private lands is confined chiefly to the 

 protection of the merchantable timber. Cut-over lands and young 

 tree growth are usually not protected except as may be necessary to 

 safeguard the mature timber; and over a great part of the country 

 there is practically no effort whatever to keep out fires. 



Timberland owners feel that they can not change their present 

 methods. They have purchased the land to exploit the timber and not 

 to grow a new crop of trees. For an owner who intends to hold his 

 lands, forestry is just as essential as is agriculture to a farmer. But 

 most timberland owners do not intend to hold their lands after cut- 

 ting the timber ; and they see no reason why they should expend money 



