286 



TIMBER RESOURCES FOR AMERICA'S FUTURE 



5,210,000 



400,000 '^^^^^ 

 ACRES 



52,000,000 

 ACRES 



acceptable acceptable plantoble area, 

 plantations plantations 1952 

 established up to and including 

 in 1952 1952 



Figure 93 



cent of such lands, with the rest all in the North. 

 Nearly one-half of it is in private ownership ; about 

 one-fourth is national-forest land; and the rest is 

 in other Federal, State, and local ownerships. 



About 20 percent of the area of plantable non- 

 commercial forest land shoiild be devoted to water- 

 shed protection and improvement. The bulk of 

 the remainder needs wildlife habitat improvement. 



Shelterbelt Planting 



Shelterbelts established and stiU in existence 

 in 1952 totaled 589 thousand acres, and were 

 largely concentrated in the Plains Region of the 

 North. Public ownership is rare for virtually all 

 such plantings are on private land. 



Additional shelterbelts are desirable, and there 

 will very likely be more of this planting in the 

 future. They may ultimately approach 3 million 

 acres. Almost all of this increase will be on 

 private lands. 



PLANTING HIGHLIGHTS 



(1) Main planting job still lies ahead. The 

 task of reclaiming idle forest land in the United 

 States by artificial regeneration has merely 

 started. Acceptable plantations cover only 5 

 million acres as of 1952. There is an additional 

 52 million acres of plantable area, which is equiva- 

 lent to 11 percent of all commercial forest land. 

 Nearly 84 percent of plantable area is located in 

 the eastern half of the United States and is almost 

 evenly divided between North and South. 



(2) Bulk of plantable area is in private owner- 

 ship. Only 16 percent of plantable area is in 

 public ownership as compared to 84 percent in 

 private ownership. 



(3) Plantable area can add substantially to 

 timber supplies. The full significance of the po- 

 tential benefits from restoring idle lands to produc- 

 tion by artificial restocking cannot be appraised 

 fully without looking ahead many years. Maxi- 

 mum values from current planting will not be 

 realized until after the year 2000. Bj^ that time, 

 trees measured now in numbers of planting stock 

 will be measiu^ed in board-feet of lumber and 

 cords of pulpwood. If the 52 million acres of 

 plantable area were producing at a rate of 150 

 board-feet of net growth per acre per year, they 

 would add about 8 billion board-feet annually 

 to timber supplies. 



(4) Planting trend is upward. The annual rate 

 of planting increased from 68 thousand acres in 

 1926-29 to 388 thousand in 1950-52, and it is 

 expected to go higher. From the 1952 total of 

 400,000 acres planted acceptably, the rate may 

 rise to a maximum of more than 800 thousand 

 acres during the period 1965-74. Because of 

 increased planting and a natural reduction in 

 plantable area, most of the present plantable 

 area maj^ be reforested by the turn of the centiirj". 

 However, even with the upward trend in planting, 

 much of the plantable area will not be planted 

 in time to contribute to our sawtimber supplies 

 by the year 2000. 



(5) Planting estimates are conservative. Im- 

 pressive as they may be, the estimates given here 

 for plantable area present only a part of the 

 planting picture. The parts not presented, pri- 

 marily the planting of medium-stocked lands on 

 which stocking should be improved by artificial 

 regeneration and planting instead of waiting for 

 natural regeneration after cutting, are vitall}^ 

 important, too, if we are to meet the timber 

 demands of the future. If all planting had been 

 included, total planting possibilities and needs 

 would be substantially greater than the estimates 

 in this appraisal. 



