SAND PINERY LANDS. 
49 
effect of the fire is visible in the stunted growth of the young 
trees; aspen, which in the original forest grow often several feet 
a, year in height, remain short runts and it is not until ten and 
more years of rest from fire have permitted the accumulated 
litter to improve the soil, that a more vigorous growth becomes 
apparent. Tracts of this kind occur in every county, but they 
form only a small percentage of the total area of cut-over lands; 
they are troublesome to clear after the thickets once have at¬ 
tained considerable height and they furnish no good pasture. 
To continue them as woodlands they require merely protection 
from fire, and for their improvement pine should be supplied 
either as seed or plants wherever it is wanting. 
2. Where the old stand of pine was broken, and a consid¬ 
erable mixture of small pine and hardwoods existed, there re¬ 
mains after the first fire a large amount of scorched and charred 
standing, dead and dying material. In this, as in the following 
form of cut-over pinery lands, young growth readily succeeds 
provided fires are not repeated. But this happy accident does 
not generally occur; the great quantity of dead material, most 
of which does not fall during any one year, keeps the ground 
furnished for several years with debris and thus invites the re¬ 
turn of fires, which continue to come until the ground is largely 
cleared. The area now resembles the case first considered; it 
is a stump prairie, though usually not as clean. Here, too, the 
return of tree growth is very slow and often discouraged alto¬ 
gether for years. 
3. Where groves of sapling pine have been culled of their 
larger timber and are then fired, the greater part of the remain¬ 
ing growth is injured and much of it is killed. These injured 
groves are generally of little promise in themselves; their growth 
is hampered, the:-* scorched butts doomed to decay; but they are 
valuable in so far a they readily restock the ground with young 
timber, providing this is not killed by fire. If fire occur, which 
is the more common case, the entire grove is either gradually 
burned and killed, or if the fire gets in during a very dry season 
