266 CONDITIONS BY COUNTIES. 



Lumber Company, at j\Iabie, completed work in 1908 ; Himmel- 

 rick Lumber Company, at Coalton, 1895 to 1908 ; and Jennings- 

 ton Lumber Company at Jenningston, sold to Laurel River 

 Lumber Company in 1908. 



No definite data have been collected regarding the cutting 

 of ties, poles, staves, shingles, etc. in the county, nor of the cut- 

 ting of the large number of chestnut oaks for tan-bark. 



Present Forest Conditions. 



There are probably not far from 125,000 acres of cleared 

 land in the county. Of this approximately one-half lies along the 

 bottoms and foot-hills of the Tygarts Valley river and Leading 

 creek, and the other half in the region of Helvetia on the south- 

 west, in the mountainous limestone region on Dry Fork of Cheat, 

 and in small farms scattered throughout the area. 



The great wgin forests — aggregating about 195,000 acres 

 — lie principally on the Cheat waters east of the crest of Cheat 

 mountain, and on the headwaters of Middle Fork river. It is 

 said that about 85,000 acres of this contains spruce timber in 

 varying quantities. Hemlock is found in abundance on almost 

 every tract. There are almost 200,000 acres of cut-over forest 

 land in the county. This lies in large and small areas through- 

 out the forest region adjoining the lands which have not yet been 

 cut over. In some sections, notably along Gandy creek and 

 Glady Fork of Cheat, fire has killed the young growth that was 

 left by the lumbemien and thousands of acres now contain 

 nothing more valuable in the way of tree species than wild red 

 cherries and yellow birches. In some places even these have 

 been killed and a dense growth of blackberry briers and ferns 

 have sprung up in their places. There is an area of large ex- 

 tent on the Roaring Plains, where the eastern line of the county 

 follows the crest of Alleghany mountains, which is almost en- 

 tirely without vegetation of any kind. The frequent fires in 

 the region not only destroyed the trees and shrubs but the soil 

 also. 



Granting that there are 4 billion feet of timber yet stand- 

 ing in Randolph county (a high estimate) there are enough 

 mills now at work to cut every foot of it inside of 15 years. Some 



