10 SECOND-GROWTH HARDWOODS IK CONNECTICUT. 



The chestnut-bark disease, now so prevalent in Connecticut, pre- 

 sents a serious problem to owners of woodlands. Although it must, 

 of course, be reckoned with in the management of stands containing 

 chestnut, no detailed discussion of it is attempted in this bulletin. 

 For information on the disease readers are referred to Farmers' 

 Bulletin 467, of the U. S. Department of Agriculture, "The Control 

 of the Chestnut-Bark Disease." 



Part I of the bulletin deals briefly with present forest conditions in 

 Connecticut; Part II considers market conditions, logging cost, and 

 the value of standing timber; Part III, the yield of different types 

 and qualities of forest; and Part IV methods of management. The 

 Appendix contains volume tables for oak and chestnut. 



PART I.— PRESENT FOREST CONDITIONS IN CONNECTICUT. 



FOREST RESOURCE. 



Few of Connecticut's resources have compared in usefulness with 

 its forests. Not only have they yielded directly a great and increas- 

 ing quantity of railroad ties, telephone and telegraph poles, lumber, 

 and other products, but indirectly they have been perhaps the chief 

 factor in the success of some of the State's most valuable industries. 

 One of these, brass manufacture, owes its present supremacy largely 

 to the cheap, abundant, and constant supply of wood fuel. Lime 

 and charcoal burning, brick manufacture, and other important indus- 

 tries have in like manner profited from the forest. An immense 

 amount of firewood is used annually for household consumption. 



Compared with the production of fuel wood, the lumber output of 

 Connecticut is remarkably small. Thus, in 1908, while the lumber 

 cut amounted to 137,855,000 board feet, valued at $2,352,186, the 

 total firewood consumption in the State was estimated at 495,370 

 cords, which, at an average price of about $4.45 per cord, had a value 

 of $2,204,805. Assuming 2 cords to the 1,000 board feet— a con- 

 servative equivalent — the fuel wood consumption is comparable to a 

 lumber cut of 247,685,000 board feet. It is thus apparent that while 

 the cordwood cut was almost 80 per cent greater than the lumber 

 cut, its actual value was about 6J per cent less. The drain put upon 

 the forest for cordwood is far in excess of that for all other uses 

 combined. 



It is not, however, in the mere quantity of wood removed that this 

 drain is most serious. Almost all of the cordwood cut consists of 

 small and rapidly growing trees, of relatively small present worth, 

 but capable of furnishing within comparatively few years poles, lum- 

 ber, or other products of greater value than cordwood or even than 

 ties. Disregard of this potential value of the forest inevitably results 



