. Vol. LXVI. No. 3001. 
NEW YORK, AUGUST 3, 1907. 
WEEKLY, 61.00 PEll YEAR 
LOCUST TIMBER FOR PROFIT. 
A Forty-Year Crop That Pays . 
“Locust posts will last forever, ’cause father tried it 
twice and he knows.” This belief of the small boy in 
the ability of locust timber to resist decay is become 
almost proverbial. In greenhouse construction, when 
supporting timbers are exposed to conditions most fa¬ 
voring fungus growth, locust is the one native wood 
sought for. The Pennsylvania Railroad, after careful 
testing, reports that locust is the best timber for cross 
ties. And yet to many farmers the popular notion is i 
little more than a myth, the builder and the railroad 
engineer get all of the scanty stock of locust at their 
own prices and locust posts often sell at public sales for 
no more than chestnut. A neighbor said he would not 
use locust for posts, because a bar post he had set last 
Spring checked and split and he regarded the tree as 
the worst weed on the place. Any very hard wood if 
cut in the sap and immediately exposed to air and sun 
will check severely in rapid drying and this very hard¬ 
ness is one of the winning qualities of the wood; 
coupled with the antiseptic, rot-resisting powers of the 
Catalpa, it possesses a hardness of fiber superior to 
that of the best White oak, as proved by use as rail¬ 
road ties where the cutting of the tie under the rail 
is the greatest difficulty. When to these two qualities 
is added the tendency of the tree to form a tall, slen¬ 
der trunk, it is evident that we have an almost ideal 
tree for poles, posts and ties. In open groves and 
in single specimens on lawns the locust grows prac¬ 
tically into a pole. In rich land in Chester County, 
Pa., a narrow strip of locust—closely joining a 40- 
vear-old stand of “second growth’” chestnut, oak, tulip 
and other kinds—have not only developed tall, straight 
trunks, but they have equaled in height the older trees. 
When cut last year they were large enough for small 
“wire fence” posts at 80 feet from the ground. The 
following table presents graphically the story of one 
of these trees, one that was carefully selected as rep¬ 
resenting the average of 30 cut. The measurements 
were taken from narrow disks cut, the first from the 
stump (one foot high), the second from the top of a 
seven-foot post, and so on up. In the “height” column 
are given distances from the ground in feet. The diam¬ 
eter is mean, not including bark, measured in inches; 
by “age” is signified the number of rings or layers of 
yearly growth found in each disk. The last column 
gives in inches the width at each point of the last 10 
years’ growth, in one-half the increase in diameter: 
Height. 
Diameter. 
Width of last 
Age. 10 rings outside. 
1 
11.1 
41 
1.4 
8 
10. 
36 
1.4 
15 
9.4 
32 
.85 
22 
S.2 
32 
1.2 
29 
7.8 
28 
1 . 
36 
* 7.6 
17 
.8 
43 
7. 
26 
1 . 
50 
6.2 
23 
1.3 
57 
5.4 
20 
1.9 
64 
4.2 
16 
1.5 
ige width 
of last 10 
years' growth. 
.. .1.24 in. 
Average yearly increase in diameter.25 in. 
In 40 years, then, these trees have each made 21.41 
cubic feet of wood, a little over a quarter of a cord of 
split wood. And this tree during its last five years 
was growing at the rate of five per cent of its volume 
per year. The average annual increase during the last 
10 years is over six per cent, indicating that the locust 
at 40 years is nearing the end of its period of probable 
growth. As cut into posts these 21.4 cubic feet of 
locust wood sold for $3.60 net (equal stumpage value), 
measured for ties a little under “standard” specifica¬ 
tions it would have produced three ties and seven posts, 
representing a stumpage, value of $3.32. This counts 
ties at 75 cents delivered at the railroad, 10 cents more 
than was obtainable at that time. These figures, typi¬ 
cal, but perhaps a little above the average, will serve 
to impress the value side of Yellow locust culture. 
There is only this one species (Robinia pseudacacia) 
worth considering in the East; the Clammy locust (R. 
viscosa) is a smaller and rather prettier tree and the 
Rose acacia (R. hispida)-~is only a tall, ornamental 
shrub. There is a western species (R. Neo-Mexicana), 
A BACKYARD LOCUST TREE. Fig. 286. 
similar to ours. But there are several horticultural 
forms or varieties of the true locust that should be 
avoided for post plantings. Last Winter in a section 
of Belmont County, Ohio, I found the roadside locust 
a decidedly branching, round-headed type, distinguish¬ 
able at a distance only by the clinging seed pods. I 
was unable to trace these trees to their source, but have 
no doubt that they came from a stock of seed secured 
FORTY-YEAR-OLD LOCUSTS. Fig. 287. 
from some of the dwarf or weeping varieties, for in the 
woodland the native tree was true to the type already 
described. The Honey locust (Gleditschia triacanthos) 
is not a locust, but closely related; its needlelike thorns 
make it an effective hedge fence and as a post tree it is 
inferior to the locust, except in its immunity from 
borers. 
There is just one great drawback to locust as a 
wood-lot tree, just one limitation to the statement that 
it is easily the best tree for a man to plant for his own 
profit. If in your neighborhood the Locust borer is an 
active agent the planting of locusts can result only in 
loss of money and a great strain on the planter’s vocab¬ 
ulary. In the Landreth planted forest in tide-water 
Virginia nearly 100,000 locusts had reached a height of 
12 feet, the branches were interlaced and the whole 
formed a densely crowded woods, set 4x4 feet. The 
borer practically destroyed them, it seemed, suddenly. 
On a farm one mile from the grove referred to early in 
this paper some locust trees by the lane fence have 
been struggling with the borers at least since the present 
owner was a little boy. The sprouts come up vigor¬ 
ously, the borers work away until the weakened stem 
breaks off and then the process is repeated. The 
statement has been made quite recently that in no place 
is the locust safely free from the ravages of this insect, 
and therefore the same writer predicts the locust will 
never become a factor in the post and tie timber supply. 
The harvest I have already referred to suggests a doubt 
as to the trustworthiness of these statements. I have 
visited two districts in which are many locust trees in 
the woods and along ’the roadsides where there is no 
evidence of the pest. But it is certainly true that ex¬ 
cept in these few immune districts it is useless to plant 
unless some method of control is devised. 
I have made a careful study of all locust trees in 
three districts, one in Chester County, Pa., one in Co¬ 
lumbiana County, Ohio, the other in Burlington County, 
N. J., in order to find some explanation of the ex¬ 
tremely “local” variation above referred to, where in 
Chester County, Pa., less than a mile separated a free 
from an infected district. The only hint ^ found in 
the scanty studies available of the insect (Clytus 
pyctus) was that the velvet black yellow-banded beetle 
feeds on the flowers of the goldenrod (Solidago), and 
m my study this goldenrod proved to be the only vari¬ 
able factor. Another theory, that shade discouraged 
the borer, seems to connect directly with the golden¬ 
rod influence. The trees, borer free, studied in detail 
previously, have been growing as part of a dense wood, 
and bordering clean truck patch and lawn; the neigh¬ 
boring patch, borer riddled, grows in a rough, rock- 
and-rail fence line always beautiful with goldenrod. In 
Ohio I found several evidences of the same thing. 
Full-grown trees on a clean road bank bordering a 
close-cropped pasture field were sound—half a mile 
down the road the grounds were less neat and the 
locust trunks showed many of the tell-tale sawdust 
marks. Landreth’s experience shows that the locust 
tree’s own shade does not discourage the borer, and 
in one large mixed wood lot in Ohio I found confirma¬ 
tion of this, while in the same wood was a further 
suggestion: Where the locust was associated with 
heavier foliaged trees, as tulip and chestnut, in crowded 
stand there were no borings. So with the goldenrod. 
On the ragged field side and the wood border it ap¬ 
peared in abundance; almost as freely was it growing 
under the groups of locust alone, but under the dense 
mixed wood there was none. No goldenrod, no borers. 
So I went home and that Fall I planted locust and 
Catalpa in mixture. My friend the bug man laughed; 
but I have faith that if this hint is followed out by 
one who has time to extend the study far enough to 
establish proofs that right here will be found the key 
to the situation. Some writers say that the Clytus 
beetles mate on the trunks of the tree. I have seen 
thousands of them mating and feeding upon the flowers 
of the goldenrod. On emerging from the tree trunk 
in August and September they directly hunt food, the 
impregnated eggs are deposited on first locust found. 
How far the creatures can fly I can’t pretend to know, 
