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MISC. PUBLICATION 2 4 9, U. S. DEPT. OF AGRICULTURE 



Forestry in Puerto Rico, and about 80 research project locations. More 

 than 1,000 technical men are engaged in this work, and additional tem- 

 porary assistants are employed in some phases of it when needed. The 

 majority of the technical men and women are forestry school graduates, 

 but geologists, entomologists, pathologists, botanists, chemists, engineers, 

 economists, statisticians, and others are also engaged. 



Most of the technicians employed in research have had advanced train- 

 ing; many have doctors' degrees or their equivalent. The various phases 

 of forest research require as a foundation broad training in natural science 

 with emphasis on forestry, regardless of whether the technician is to deal 

 with forest management and protection, watershed management, range 

 management, forest products, or forest economics. Advanced work — be- 

 yond this foundation training in forestry — may be in any one or more of 

 a large group of biological or other sciences, such as plant physiology, 

 pathology, entomology, ecology, soils, genetics, taxonomy, mathematics, 

 and organic chemistry. 



A forest-research project. 



The rate of snow melt in the forest is studied with the help of 

 special equipment. 



State and Private Forest Cooperation 



About 386 million acres, or nearly four-fifths of our total commercial 

 timber-growing area, are now in State or private ownership. Of this, 359 

 million acres are privately owned and include 165 million acres in farm 

 woodlands. The area under State or county ownership is continuously in- 

 creasing through public acquisition for State forest purposes and through 

 tax delinquency. 



The future of forestry in the United States depends in no small degree 

 upon acceptance and operation of better forestry practices on private lands. 



