TIMBER GROWING IN DOUGLAS FIR REGION is 
mable weeds—hawkweed, thistle, bracken fern, and fireweed. These 
prolong the period of acute fire risk until the less inflammable bushes 
have regained the ground or the young trees have made a continuous 
cover. 
LOGGING AS IT AFFECTS REFORESTATION 
In western Washington there is cut over annually some 145,000 
acres of mature timber, and in western Oregon about 60,000 acres. 
- This cut is in both the Lite fir type DEORE r and the fog belt, most 
of it in the former. on private 
land. The following fen applies a ‘the te apis on the 
private lands without reference to the system of cutting in effect on 
the national forests under governmental regulation. Briefly, present 
logeing practice is about as follows: 
The entire stand is felled, except such scattered trees as are too 
defective from decay or other causes to be of value to the logger and 
such small trees as are unmerchantable. The logs are then removed 
by powerful donkey engines or by skidders, either by the overhead 
(or skyline) system, by the hich-lead method or, rarely now, by the 
ground-yarding method. Railroads are customarily used in con- 
junction with the larger operations. Most operations are continuous 
the year through or are suspended only for a short period in the winter 
or when the market is off. 
The quantity of débris—cull logs, tops, fallen rotten trees, branches, 
and broken-down undergrowth—which litters the ground on the con- 
clusion of logging is enormous. Ordinarily this slashing is burned 
broadcast at a convenient and safe time from a few months to two 
or three years after legging, unless, as is very often the case, it has 
already caught fire accidentally. Of course, the fire hazard in a 
logging operation does not all come from the oper ation itself. Some 
of the fires are due to other agencies, including lightning, berry pickers, 
hunters, ee and campers, and common-carrier railroads. 
Disposal of sl lashings which are a menace is required by the laws 
of both States. Slash burning is done either in the spring or fall but 
more commonly in the fal!. There is little preparation for the slash 
burn except removal of logging equipment from the zone of danger. 
An effort is made to keep the fire out of standing timber and the 
operation. ‘Too often the burning is taken casually and no forehanded 
ageressive plans are made in advance to control the fire effectively. 
Sometimes the slash fire spreads to lands once burned, and unless 
there is timber, equipment, or other property in its path, but slight 
effort if any is usually made to prevent it from doing so. } 
Upon the conclusion of “‘fallmg,’’ logging, and slash disposal, the 
average area is usually devoid of living trees. . The smaller trees left 
by the fallers have for the most part been knocked down by the 
logging lines or burned in the slash fire, and of the few larger trees 
which were culled and left standing some if not all have | been killed 
im the broadcast burning. Standing dead trees or ‘‘snags,’’ varying 
m height from a few feet to 200 feet, are scattered over the area. 
Their abundance depends upon the number of dead trees in the 
original forest and the type of logging used. A check of the snags. 
on a number of representative logged-off tracts shows anywhere from 
1 snag to each 5 acres to 5 snags to the acre, considering only 
those over 20 inches in diameter. On a few operations snags are 
