32 



areas of greater or less extent which have been opened for agri- 

 cultural purposes; but the percentage of woodland and of non- 

 agricultural land is high. These are the counties, also, in which 

 most of the rivers of the State have their sources and whose far- 

 ests are deserving of special protection on account of their in- 

 fluence on water supply and distribution. 



The seven counties having the largest area of virgin forest still 

 standing are Pocahontas with 212,000 acres, Randolph vsdth 195,- 

 000 acres, Greenbrier with 140,000 acres, Pendleton with 138,000 

 acres, Nicholas with 130,000 acres, Webster with 122,000 acres, 

 and Raleigh with 117,000 acres. The most extensive cut-over 

 areas are in the recently lumbered sections of the counties named 

 above and those adjacent to them along the Alleghany Mountains 

 and in six or seven counties south of the Great Kanawha Rive;*. 



The whole western half of the State and several of the counties 

 east of the mountains have only here and there scattered boun- 

 daries of woodland which are of sufficient size and possess a suf- 

 ficient quantity of timber to justify us in classifying them as 

 forest land. The area which is in woodlots in these regions varies 

 from about 15 to 60 per cent, the woodlots differing almost as 

 much both in the quantity and the character of their timber trees 

 as do the virgin and cUt-over forests. There are some counties — 

 of which Monroe, Upshur and Ritchie may be taken as fair ex- 

 amples — where there are numerous woodlots that contain a great 

 deal of valuable timber; and there are others along the Ohio 

 River and on the extreme east where the average woodlot no long- 

 er affords anything more profitable than inferior cross-ties and 

 poles, and these in comparatively small numbers. 



We are justified by the conditions found in the carelessly-man- 

 aged woodlots throughout the State in asserting that methods 

 almost wasteful have been employed by the operators of lumber 

 plants, whose extravagance is so often justly decried. A moment's 

 reflection will convince even the casual observer who has travel- 

 ed over West Virginia that there is scarcely a single farm within 

 our borders which has not at least a few acres of rough land that 

 is unfit for cultivation. These places might be made to grow 

 valuable stands of fast-growing trees, such as yellow locust, and 

 at the same time be immensely valuable as protectors of springs 

 and small watercourses, and greatly beneficial in checking erosion 

 of soils. Many thousands of acres, in the aggregate, of such areas 



