50 
FORESTS OF WISCONSIN. 
and attains considerable proportions, the entire grove is changed 
at once into a tangle of scorched and charred poles, which require 
for their improvement either a great amount of labor and ex¬ 
pense or else the starting of more fires to first get rid of the 
debris. Where fire runs through slashings (in large timber) too 
early in the season when the ground is still wet, and also where 
no fire occurs for several years after logging, so that the leaves 
have become litter, and the small twigs are decayed, then the 
slashings, even of wasteful operations where large amounts of 
heavy tops and much dead and down material exists, are often 
not burned clean and the ground is strewn with scorched logs 
and tops, and many cases exist where settlers are logging today 
on old slashings of this kind although not a living pine occurs. 
It is but natural that these several forms grade into each other, 
and that nearly every slashing, especially during the first few 
years, markedly changes its complexion. In general the bare 
land form predominates in all pinery areas and occupies today 
probably about 70 per cent, of the cut-over lands. 
Loam and Clay Lands. —4. A greater admixture of hard¬ 
woods, due to the presence of a larger amount of clay in the soil, 
materially affects the condition of the cut-over land. If pine 
was predominant and the hardwoods scant, as on the red clays 
about Lake Superior and on the poorer gravelly loam, the re¬ 
moval of the heavy stand of pine commonly involves almost a 
total destruction of the hardwoods just as in the case of the regu¬ 
lar pinery; the ground is soon cleared by a repetition of fires, the 
aspen ceases to return. Unlike the sands, however, these loam 
lands soon produce a fair amount of grass and the land is con¬ 
verted into pasture. 
5. Where the hardwood is heavier, and especially where 
hemlock enters into the composition of the forest, the dead tim¬ 
ber remains standing for years. A forest of dead trees and often 
400-800 cords of timber per acre may be seen after repeated and 
often severe fires have swept over the ground. Such areas are 
not rare; the fires of 1894 created quite a number. They are 
