Part V.] Sweet: On Air Seasoning of Indian Timbers. 
19 
(4) Concerning the other species experimented with to date, the 
evidence at hand indicates that girdling involves too much 
risk of damage from insects to make the practice feasible. 
(iv) Green Conversion. 
The conversion of logs immediately after felling, and the proper 
stacking and protection of the timber permit of greater control and 
regulation of the seasoning process than the other methods under 
consideration. Success with any of the methods depends, more than 
anything else, upon the care with which the timber is handled after 
conversion; and if this factor is given due consideration, most of the 
woods cut from green logs may be seasoned quite as satisfactorily as 
those cut from partially seasoned logs. Prompt conversion is the 
generally accepted practice in other large timber producing countries; 
and there is little to indicate that, in spite of the trying climatic con- 
ditions of India, it should not become the standard practice here. 
Insects and fungi are the common enemies of timber, especially 
while in the log, and prompt conversion and controlled seasoning 
accomplish about all that can be done in preventing the development 
of these agents of destruction. By prompt conversion conditions 
which are the least favourable to the development of fungi and 
insects are brouoht about at once. The softer woods which are 
especially liable to this kind of damage must be converted green. 
Wood containing incipient decp,y, as many logs do to some extent, is 
exposed at once to the atmosphere by prompt conversion and thus 
loses quickly the moisture which is essential to the growth of decay 
organisms. 
Under controlled conditions of seasoning even the most refractory 
woods may be seasoned quite as well by green conversion as by other 
methods. If logs are converted immediately after felling, the losses 
due to splitting are greatly reduced inasmuch as much of the splitting 
that occurs in converted timber is due to that which occurred, or at 
least started, in the log before conversion. Consequently, the sooner 
the logs are converted, the better will be the condition of the lumber. 
Boards and scantlings sawn from freshly cut logs do not show the 
tendency to split at the ends to the same extent as those cut from 
logs which have seasoned for some period of time. In these experi- 
ments the splitting by green conversion was on the average 24 per 
cent, less than by seasoning in the log. The experiments have shown 
further that surface cracking, on the average, is no more pronounced 
in timber converted green than in that held in the log for partial 
seasoning. This is particularly the case if proper care is taken to 
protect the freshly converted timber from too rapid drying as in the 
sun or by exposure To hot, dry winds. 
That certain species Odina Wodier, for example, can be sawn only 
with the greatest difficulty in the green condition because of exuda- 
tions of gum from the wood on to the saw cannot be overlooked. In 
[ 165 ] B 2 
