4 BULLETIN 91, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
The clearing and management of the logged-off lands is the most _ 
pressing problem in most of these counties. The object of the inves- 
tigations conducted by the Office of Farm Management has been to 
obtain data from which to acquaint the public with the large areas of 
undeveloped land in these sections and the nature of the work neces- _ 
sary to make them available for agricultural purposes. A study has — 
also been made of all the different conditions of clearing and the best 
methods practiced in the different sections, with the object of com- 
bining the best practices into a system or number of systems of clear- 
ing adapted to the region. 
Fic. 1.—Characteristic stump land in the Lake region. 
At the present time very little logged-off land that would make de- 
sirable farm land can be bought for less than $15 to $25 per acre. As 
the cost of clearing varies from $20 to $90 per acre, the cost of farm 
land cleared of stumps will run from $35 to $115 per acre, the average 
being about $65. When the cost of other necessary Improvements 
is added to this, it makes the ultimate cost of animproved farm higher 
than the price of equally as good a farm in many of the older, well- 
settled agricultural sections of the United States. The high price of 
the logged-off land and the high cost of clearing seriously retard its 
development. 
The methods given in this bulletin, while extensively used, are not 
necessarily the best possible. There is plenty of room for improve- — 
ment in all the methods now practiced. 
