IOWA ACADEMY OF SCIENCES 
213 
“It is obvious that the work of planting with beach grass must be 
first, and that this must be followed up by planting shrubs and trees 
of rapid growth, interspersed with those of slow growth before the labor 
of planting shall be compleiea." 
Mr. A. S. Hitchcock of the Division of Agrostology in bulletin 57 of 
the Bureau of Plant Industry, entitled “Methods used for Controling and 
Reclaiming Sand Dunes’", writes; 
“The reclamation is most permanent when the dunes are covered 
with forest; hence forestation is the ultimate aim w'herever possible.” 
The director of the Central Experiment Station at Ottawa, Canada, 
was sent abroad in 1901 by the home government to investigate dune 
planting for the purpose of planting and reclaiming the shifting sands 
of Sable Island off the eastern coast of Canada. After making thorough 
investigations in France, Holland and Denmark, he reports that trees 
must be used if permanent results are to be obtained. 
Mr. John Gifford, in writing of the dune region of France, says in 
part : 
“By the formation of these dunes in Gascony 1,625,000 acres of lana 
were made productive and today this region is a health resort. They 
have demonstrated fully that there is no better way of fixing shifting 
sands or reclaiming sweeps and removing pestilence than bj^ forest plant- 
ing.” 
The methods of planting and reclaiming used in Gascony are practi- 
cally the same as those used all over Europe and in northern and south- 
ern Africa. While conditions and circumstances in the United States 
are very different, yet the general problem is the same and the work in 
Europe forms a splendid basis upon which to outline the work here. 
Their long list of successes cannot be other than an incentive tor the 
commencement and successful completion of the holding and planting 
of sand dunes along our coasts and rivers and the reclamation of the 
immense tracts of sand hills, sand barrens and sand plains, which consti- 
tute parts of a number of our states. 
DUNE BECLAMATION IN THE UNITED STATES. 
The work of planting and holding dunes and sand wastes in our coun- 
try has been very limited and is still in the experimental stage. At Cape 
Cod as early as 1826-38 planting of beach grass was made by the govern- 
ment and the town of Provincetown at a cost of $28,000. Constant care 
was not given this planting and the poorer class of fishermen and 
laborers cu the sod and removed woody growth until the dune lands re- 
verted to their original conditions. Only now with renewed efforts is the 
work beginning to be successful. Along the coast of Long Island and 
New Jersey a few scattered attempts have been made to hold the dunes, 
but nothing of importance has been accomplished. A little plant- 
ing of grass has been done at the mouth of the Kalamazoo 
river, but the work was not continued and now conditions are 
even worse than they were before this work was started. Perhaps the 
