PRACTICE OF TIMBER ESTIMATING 
193 
Carefully training in this way, a man will find himself 
able to guess within 2 feet of the 59. 
The timber may be estimated according to any method 
deemed most satisfactory. It may be calipered by an 
assistant and the factor of height gone into to any extent 
thought best, but most men in the spruce region do that 
only as a check, while in common practice, after count¬ 
ing the trees of any species or class, they estimate their 
contents on the basis of so many to the cord or to the 
thousand. Occasional calipering and height measurement 
as a check on the eye are highly desirable, and volume 
tables also are a help in most cases. But some species of 
trees (as cedar and beech in many localities) are so im¬ 
perfect and defective that volume tables, if they were in 
existence, could not be depended upon. Such timber 
has to be estimated out of hand, and lumbering expe¬ 
rience, together with the figures of the scale rule carried 
either in a man’s head or in his pocket, will prove the best 
equipment for it. 
One advantage of this method is its cheapness — one 
man may do the work alone. Further, all doubtful points 
are settled on the ground, face to face with the timber —■ 
there is no discounting or computing afterwards more 
than to add up the results. Then the small size of the 
area and the nearness of the observer to the trees under 
consideration enable him, if he has proper experierice and 
judgment, to set contents very close. Lastly it will be 
seen that the systematic travel followed gives, in a simple 
country, material for mapping its timber types, also its 
topography, as was explained in Part 2 of this volume. 
Following are specimen notes of a line of estimate run 
directly across a section with quarter-acre counts taken 
150 paces apart. The timber is scored in the following 
classes : (a) spruce above cutting limit of 14 inches 
stump diameter in board feet; (6) smaller spruce down 
to 6 inches breast diameter, in cords; (c) fir in cords; 
(i d ) cedar in feet B. M.; ( e ) pine; (/) good hard-wood 
logs. Number and contents of trees both given. 
This method of timber cruising may be employed on 
land areas of any size, and has been largely employed on 
areas of a mile square, or “ sections.” 
