TIMBER GROWING AND LOGGING PRACTICE 33 
old trees which were left standing to scatter their seed over the area 
have fulfilled their function as soon as a good stand of young trees 
is established. If old, defective, large-topped, or crooked and of 
poor timber value present or prospective, they should be cut out. 
They will serve no further useful purpose and are taking up space 
that should be occupied by young, vigorous trees. 
These operations may mean more expense to the owner than the 
material cut out will be worth; in fact, the timber may have no 
commercial value whatever. The chief return from the operations 
will be the assurance of increased value of the mature stand owing 
to the higher proportion of better species composing it. On farms, 
these operations can often be carried on during the winter when other 
work is slack at no actual outlay of cash ; moreover, they should be 
the means of supplying the year's fuel wood. 
PROTECTION 
The protective measures to be taken against fire have been ade- 
quately outlined in a previous section. Those necessary to keep 
forest land productive will be ample to insure full timber crops. 
Protection against overgrazing has also been outlined sufficiently. 
There would be more assurance of beech and oak production, par- 
ticularly of white oak, if hogs could be prevented from roaming at 
will. Their appetite for acorns and beechnuts is otherwise liable 
to eliminate or greatly reduce these species. 
Protection against forest insects and diseases is most urgent. 
The forest owner is almost helpless when it comes to combating the 
sweeping attacks of these enemies by any of the direct methods com- 
monly applied to shade and roadside trees. Where attacks are oc- 
curring or are imminent, the woods owner can only discriminate 
against the species subject to attack by removing them in cutting and 
thinning operations. White pine can be protected against blister 
rust by pulling up all wild and cultivated currant and gooseberry 
bushes within or near the tract of white-pine timber. 
In parts of this region the ashes have been heavily infected with 
oyster-shell scale; hickory in northeastern Ohio is being killed by 
the hickory-bark beetle; the black locust has suffered severely from 
both the locust borer and the locust-leaf beetle. Doubtless other 
species of trees have been sever aly attacked by insects and by diseases. 
No definite recommendations for control of all insects or diseases 
which attack trees in this region can be attempted here. In case of 
trouble with insects or diseases the advice of the State or Federal 
forest entomologist should be sought in the first instance and of the 
forest pathologist in the second. 
PUBLIC MEASURES 
PROTECTION 
Public protection measures, like private measures, differ in no way 
from the minimum measures to keep timberland productive save in 
the warfare on insects and diseases. Public assistance in the control 
