88 BULLETIN 129%, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 
On one part of an area logged in 1917 fire escaped and burned the 
slash, while from the other the fire was excluded. The burned area 
was, for all practical purposes, completeiy devastated. The advance 
reproduction and even the remaining seed trees were killed. Brush 
is now in possession of the ground, and the return of a reasonably good 
forest cover will be a matter of decades at best. A cruise strip on 
the area showed no living reproduction or larger trees for a distance 
of more than half a mile. The unburned area in contrast is in very 
fair condition, with a reasonable amount of advance growth and seed 
trees. 
- Fires on cut-over lands destroy the great bulk of advance reproduc- 
tion, even though seed trees may survive. Where minimum damage 
occurs, however, as is the case with uncontrolled spring or fall slash 
fires, the slash itself is incompletely consumed and the dead repro- 
duction adds to the fuel for another fire. 
Under rare circumstances, representing much less than 1 per cent 
of the total cut-over area, excellent stands of reproduction have come 
in after an exceedingly hot summer slash fire. This has occurrred on 
small areas where the fire in the early fall followed so closely upon 
cutting that the seed crop was still in the cones and was thus pro- 
tected from fire. In nearly all such instances, also, the following 
erowing season was distinctly favorable to the establishment of 
reproduction. 
Slash fires in most cases result in devastation and the occupancy 
of the land by brush. At the very least they destroy or seriously 
reduce the advance growth. Oniy under, the most exceptional 
circumstances does a new stand of reproduction follow a typicai 
slash fires. 
EFFECT ON REPRODUCING AREAS 
It should be noticed that slash fires in the pine region are as likely 
to result in a partly stocked, patchy forest, damaged by fire and 
disease, as they are to denude cut-over lands completely. While the 
complete devastation of a third out of large areas of cut-over land 
is perhaps the most serious outcome, the fact that thousands of acres 
are producing wood at only a fractional part of their capacity is of 
almost equal importance. | 
This aspect of slash fires is admirably illustrated by the results of 
an intensive cruise (/) made by one of the large operating companies 
on its own lands. This cruise was made in order to ascertain the 
amount and distribution of seed trees and of reproduction accumu- 
lated on the cut-over areas during 20 years. These areas were them- 
selves representative of the laissez-faire policy, under which fires were 
suppressed only when damage to merchantable timber or improve- 
ments was threatened. The relatively poor stocking which the 
cruise disclosed may unhesitatingly be charged to the widespread 
slash fires resulting from this policy, as indeed is recognized by the 
company itself. 
The results of the examination that was made show that on 16.7 
per cent of the total area the stocking of young trees was 60 per cent 
or better, averaging 72 per cent; on an additional 52.4 per cent of the 
area the stocking was from 10 to 60 per cent complete, averaging 
28.5 per cent; and on the remaining 30.9 per cent the stocking was 
under 10 per cent, or practically nonexistent. 
