370 CONSERVATION AND ITS LESSONS 



creosote or other chemicals would result in the annual saving of 

 1,500,000,000 board feet. Substitutes are being found for boxes, 

 which take a very large amount of cut lumber. And since it is 

 estimated that 25% of a tree in the forest is lost in the cutting and 



Courtesy of United States Forest Service. 



Destructive lumbering in Colorado. 



40% is wasted in the mill, it is evident that less wasteful methods 

 will conserve a large amount of the lumber now lost. 



New Forest Areas. State forestry stations and the national 

 government are reforesting cut areas, and many lumber companies 

 have begun to follow their example. Railroads annually are 

 planting thousands of young trees. Farmers have begun to 

 realize that the high price of lumber makes a wood lot often more 

 productive than other areas of similar size on the farm. Forestry 

 is becoming more and more a practical business, hundreds of young 

 men going out from schools of forestry each year, prepared to help. 

 If we all do our share, the forests will be saved. But we must 

 begin now. 



The Conservation of Fresh-water Fishes. — In another place we 

 have seen that the food supply of many of our fishes depends upon 

 the plankton, tiny plants and animals which swarm near the surface 

 of bodies of water. In many parts of the United States these little 

 organisms have been exterminated, and the food fish with them, by 

 the pollution of our streams and lakes. If crude sewage is dis- 



