10 BULLETIN 1402, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTUEE 
What returns can be expected in growth of timber if these steps 
are taken? 
In working out the answers to these questions two different groups 
of controlling factors must constantly be kept in mind and balanced 
one against the other. These are, on the one hand, the life history 
of the forest itself, particularly its manner of reproduction; on the 
other hand, the process of exploitation and subsequent care and 
treatment of cut-over lands. It is hopeless to violate the intrinsic 
needs of the forest and expect the forest to continue; it is equally 
hopeless to propose desirable but unduly costly and impracticable 
methods of logging, slash disposal, or tire protection, and expect 
them to be followed by a strongly competitive industry. 
To talk of planting as a remedy for destructive logging is to 
beg the question. Because of high cost (not less than $12 to $15 an 
acre), difficulty of the operation, particularly on stony ground, un- 
certainty of success owing to imperfectly established methods, and 
lack of forest nurseries, planting is a last resort. It is likely to be 
employed only where natural reproduction fails. The opportunity 
for timber growing in the California pine region lies primarily in 
saving what is already in existence. The young growth and seed 
trees already on the ground represent the only real basis for a new 
forest. The simple steps necessary to leave cut-over land productive 
must be taken as part of the logging operation. 
In discussing the problem of the operator who wishes to maintain 
the productivity of his timberland, it is necessary to consider not 
only the practical questions now confronting him but also the causes 
which have brought about the existing situation. Throughout its 
history the lumber industry has treated forest land as a mine from 
which to remove valuable accumulations rather than as a possible 
source of successive wood crops. This practice has resulted natu- 
rally from the enormous reservoirs of virgin stumpage available 
and from the highly competitive nature of the business, which have 
forced rapid and cheap exploitation. 
As a consequence of the urge for production and of the general 
indifference to the fate of cut-over lands, three major factors of de- 
nudation of forest land have come into existence in California. 
These are fire, methods of logging, and intensity of cutting. A 
fourth factor, overgrazing or unregulated grazing, is also of occa- 
sional importance. 
Broadcast burning of slash and uncontrolled fires on cut-over 
lands have certainly been responsible for a large share of the de- 
nudation in the past, and this factor has been recognized and dis- 
cussed almost to the exclusion of methods of logging and closeness 
of cutting. In late years, however, the high lead and high speed 
methods of power logging, and clear cutting in pure pine types, 
have come to be recognized as belonging definitely in the class of 
major factors of denudation. 
These three factors must be considered by the logging operator 
who wishes to maintain the productivity of his timberland, and who 
is therefore interested in determining, (1) the cause of losses in 
productivity now taking place and, (2) the means of reducing or 
eliminating such losses without serious disruption of existing prac- 
tices or serious additional -cost. 
