.^0 N I T E q^STAT E S 



'DEPARTMENT 

 01- AGRICULTURE 



3 /J- '^ 



T/rrH UNCLE SAI.l'S lUTURALlSTS, 



OFBieE OJ=^ 



INFORMATIO 



R ,^ 



iAN ^ 1931 t 



Airx'OUl'TII.ZI^: Our Wilds Man is fe'oing to take us into the woods 

 todayi to get ug out of the woods on some of the questions ahout 

 the woods. Since he has been talMng with Uncle Sam's Naturalists 



of the United States Forest Service, he's found out but 



weUl let him tell you what he has found o^rt. Well, Mr. I7ildsi:ian? 



•)(.■>!. ifi ^t/i -if 



The other day I was roaming through the woods, when I came 

 on a strip that has been cut practicnlly clean; cut clean and burned 

 over. 



I got to wondering just how long it would tal'e to get that land 

 back in trees. Of course, I was assuming that the seed for restocl^i- 

 ing would come from the adjacent timber and be scattered in Nature* s 

 own vray. 



But the more I wondered, the more I realized there is a lot 

 about grovi/ing trees we donH yet ''-now. We've hardly scratched 

 the barl: of such questions. But thanks to the United States Forest 

 Service v/e arc getting busy nov/ ;^oing after some of the answers. 

 In fact, I too'-r this re-seoding ouestion to a friend of mine in the 

 Forest Service, and he told me about some of the work along th^t 

 line that has been done at the Pacific Northwest Experiment St-^.tion. 



The foresters at that Station set about to find how far and 

 hov; nanj.'- seed is distributed, and what conditions make for the 

 best chances of the seed sprouting and the seedlings grov.'ing up. 

 T^iey liberated Douglas Fir seed at different heights when the vdnd 

 vras blov/ing at different rates. Seed turned loose in a lo\7 wind at 

 a. height of 200 foot fell in quantity up to 1,200 feet av/ay. In a 

 very high wind, 0ome seed traveled as far as half a mile. But in a 

 light serd year, the orpcrincnters couldn't find any seed more than 

 500 feet from the seed trees. 



Ar.d another t'^.ing, on noil blacl'iBned by a slash fire, they found 

 the surface soil in places got as hot as 144 degrees. That's enough 

 to Irill Pouglas fir seedlings, r.iat raises the question of keeping 

 fire off of cut-over land. 



