34 



MISC. PUBLICATIOíí 16 2, U. S. DÉPT. OF AGRICULTURE 



Properly handled a farm woodland is in most cases a valuable 

 asset to its owner. Besides the salable produets it may produce, 

 such as sawlogs, piling, plupwood, posts, and cross ties, it will 

 provide its owner with wood for fuel, fencing, and the many other 

 needs of the farm. This means a saving in the outlay of money for 

 the npkeep of the place, as well as a tangible income such as may 

 be derived f rom any other farm crop. The woods may also utilize 

 and make productive those parts of the farm not suitable for other 

 crops; the rough, steep, rocky and worn-out lands (fig. 18). And 

 the harvesting of the farm timber crop is usually done in the winter 

 when the regular work of the f armer is slack. 



It is estimated that one-third of the cut of timber of all kinds 

 comes from farms. According to late statistics farm forest produets 



Figtjee 18. — Farm woodlands. 



F-55996, F-202858 



A, A South Dakota prairie farmstead protected from the prevailing high winds 

 of that región by a windbreak of planted trees ; B, 50-year-old white oak timber 

 in an Ohio woodland. 



rank ninth among a total of 50 different crop items in the amount 

 of cash income they produce. The gross income from farm timber 

 produets, both used on the farm and sold, amounted to $116,728,000 

 in 1934. 



To get the best results from his woods the farmer should adopt 

 practices worked out by the forester and aim to produce a con- 

 tinuous supply of the best timber at the fastest rate. When he 

 takes out his merchantable trees, he should cut lightly — never more 

 than one-third of the stand — so that he can come back often for 

 similar light harvests. Thus he will always maintain a good stand 

 of trees — capital in his woods savings bank. Trees of the less 

 desirable kinds, the smaller overcrowded trees, and those that are 

 broken, crooked, large-limbed, or diseased, should also be taken out 

 and used for farm purposes or sold. This will allow light and 

 growing space for the main-crop trees, and the younger generations 

 fighting for a place in the sun will be helped to become the straight, 



