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AINARY REPORT |

Ke \ A

OF THE

ER OF FORESTRY

{ISCELLANEOUS PAPERS ON FORESTRY CONTAINED I ANNUAL REPOR?,
DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE, FOR 1896.

COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA—DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE,

DIVISION OF FORESTRY.

PRELIMINARY REPORT

OF THE

COMMISSIONER OF FORESTRY

FOR 18096.

ALSO MISCELLANEOUS PAPERS ON FORESTRY CONTAINED IN ANNUAL REPORT,
DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE, FOR 1896.

BY J. T. ROTHROCK,’M. D.,

COMMISSIONER OF FORESTRY,

CLARENCE M. BUSCH,
STATE PRINTER OF PENNSYLVANIA,
1897.

PRELIMINARY REPORT:

HarrispurG, Pa., January 1, 1897.
Hon. Tuomas J. Epa, Secretary of Agriculture :

Sir: I have the honor to submit the following statement of the
work done in the Division of Forestry, and to suggest some measures
which appear to be ef sufficient importance to merit careful consider-
ation. ;

The brief paper upon forest fires which appeared in the last annual
report was merely preliminary to a more full consideration of the
subject. Upon this the division is now engaged, and it is hoped,
when all the facts are ready for the public, that it will lead to a more
general attempt to discover and bring to justice those who are guilty
of starting these fires.

There are, however, certain points upon which immediate legisla-
tion should be had. For example, under the Act of June 2, 1870 (P.
L., 1316), it is declared to be the duty of the county commissioners
to appoint persons, under oath, to ferret out and bring to punishment
all persons who wilfully, or otherwise, cause the burning of timber
lands and to take measures to have such fires extinguished, where
it can be done. The expenses are to be paid out of the county
treasury, the unseated land tax to be the first applied to such ex-
penses.

This law has been practically inoperative for more than a quarter
of a century. It was not because the law was deemed unnecessary
by the citizens, but because, first, there was no clause compelling
the county commissioners to appoint detectives to ferret out the of-
fenders; and second, because if they had done so the county would
have been required to pay for the services.

The time has come when public opinion demands that the law
shall be compulsory upon the county commissioners, and further-
more, it is no longer doubted that the State has as much to gain
in preventing forest fires as the counties have, and that, therefore,
the Commonwealth should share in the cost as well as in the
benefits.

At present, Lehigh is the only county in the State which complies
with the law, so far as we are informed. Three or four counties offer
rewards for detection of incendiaries, and the remainder appear to
wholly ignore the act.

(3)

4

I would, therefore, most respectfully submit for your consideration
that the Act of June 2, 1870, be amended: First, to compel the com-
missioners of the various counties to appoint detectives, as specified
already in the act; and second, to place half of the cost of the ser-
vices upon the State.*

Nothing more inequitable appears upon our statute books than
the law as it now stands. The benefits of continuous, even water
flow, guarding against freshets on the one hand and low water on
the other, accrue to the entire community. The most potent factor
in ensuring this desirable condition is the forest cover upon the head-
waters of the streams. The counties with the largest areas of
timber, or even brush land, are those most active in guarding the
water flow of the State, but they also have the smallest population.
For the State’s good they are, as the law now is, compelled to pro-
tect the largest areas, to pay out the most for the common good,
while on the one hand they have the smallest income by tax, and on
the other they receive the least from the State for the service ren-
dered. The counties with the largest revenues would never feel
the drain upon them in protecting their forest areas, while a similar
service would keep Pike or Forest counties in a condition of bank-
ruptey.

It is now well understood that the actual loss to the State each
year from forest fires is enormous (greatly exceeding any cost of pro-
tection), but the destruction of young timber, of leaf mould and of
good soil from the same cause is, if possible, a vastly greater
calamity. In short, it is so great that it is no mere figure of speech
to say it threatens the continued prosperity of the Commonwealth.
In the present state of public information upon this important topi¢
it would seem to be the duty of the State to keep continually before
its citizens the fact that forest fires are a public foe. To this end,
I would respectfully suggest that constables be required by law to
r- port at each court of quarter sessions the number of fires withip
their districts, the season at which they occurred, the causes thereof,
the damage done, and the measures taken to apprehend those wha
caused them, the said report to be made in duplicate upon blanks
furnished by the Commissioner of Forestry, and that one copy be re-
tained by the court and the other be forwarded promptly by:
mail to the Commissioner of Forestry, and that the constables be paid
jointly by the counties and the Commonwealth for the service.+

In this connection, it might be well to call attention to the fact
that in some instances it was found to be impossible to obtain from
county officials information, which it was not less for the good of
ihe county than of the Commonwealth, should be published. With

* Act of July 15, 1897, amends act as suggested.
+ Act of March 30, 1897, make eonstables ex-officio fire wardens.

5

_ your permission, I would suggest that not only would the work of
this division be advanced, but that of the whole Department (and
possibly of other departménts) if there were had some legal relief in
this respect.*

By Act of Legislature (June 18, 18838, P. L. 112), the county commis-
sioners, through the assessors, were required to furnish annually,
upon the first day of June, “a full statement of all property taxable
for county purposes, showing the real and personal in separate
columns’—“the same to be enclosed by mail to the Secretary of
Internal Affairs.”

The returns are made upon blanks furnished by the Department of
Internal Affairs, which (blanks) contain separate columns for cleared
land and timber land. In the report of the Secretary of Internak
Affairs, Part II, for 1895, pages 216a and 217a, is a very clear show-
ing of the insufficiency of this classification of the area of the State
for the purposes of that Department. With the best intention and
even after laborious effort to report the exact ratio of cleared and
timbered land, there might still be wide discrepancies in the state:
ments of two observers, if placed in the same district. For example,
take the latest statistics from the county of Wayne, and we find
that the proportion of timber land to that of the whole county is
placed at 9.2 per cent. Whereas, in the adjoining county of Lacka-
wanna, the proportion of timber land to the entire area of the county
is placed at 16 per cent. It must be clear to any observer passing
through these counties that Wayne, as a matter of fact, has a larger
proportion of its area in real lumber than Lackawanna. The dis-
crepancy here arises from the fact that some of the assessors in
Wayne county failed, probably, to consider hard wood, such as
beech, birch and maple, as timber, ‘because it had so little value
in the market, or was so little used for purposes of construction.
The “acid factories” have been unusually active in that region be-
cause of the abundance of these woods.

The real fact is that a very large proportion, even of our country
citizens, fail to discriminate sufficiently between the different kinds
of trees. Of course this lack of exact knowledge is, as a rule, even
more marked among those who have spent their entire lives in the
towns. This condition of affairs is humiliating, but it has to be
reckoned with in all of our reports. Much as this division desires
exact specific knowledge, it is thought better to suggest a classifi-
cation of the wild or wooded lands not under cultivation, which will
now lead to the least error and encourage the hope that in the near
future we may be able to insist upon a more exact classification.

I would suggest, first, that for the purposes of the Department of

* Actapproved April 14, 1897, makes it the duty of county officials to furnish information asked for.

6

Agriculture, land which is now in sod, or in crops, or which has been
cultivated within three years, or which is about to be cultivated for
the first time, be regarded as cleared land.

Second. That land not in either of the above conditions, but cov-
ered with a growth of shrubbery less than 15 feet high, be designated
as brush land, and this be divided into two classes; i. e., valuable, if it
promises to mature into timber; or, valueless, if it gives no promise
of producing timber.

Third. That land in a woody growth which is over 15 feet high,
be designated as timber land, and divided (a) into evergreen, stating
whether pine (white or yellow), hemlock, spruce or cedar predomi-
nates; and (b) into hard wood, stating whether oak, hickory, chest-
nut, beech, birch, maple, poplar, basswood or cherry predominates;
adding whether this timber is best adapted to production of ties,
sawed timber, or of no use except as fuel. Is the timber in this
third division one-fourth, one-half, or three-fourths grown, or is it
mature?

There appears to be nothing in this which a man of ordinary intel-
ligence could not readily place in proper form if a proper blank were
furnished him. It is confessedly superficial, but it is far in advance
of what we have hitherto been able to obtain.

It is fairly a question whether or not it is wise to allow the re-
demption within two vears of land sold for taxes. Asa rule, those to
whom such land belongs are not straightened in circumstances. The
redemption clause simply, in many instances, interferes with im-
provement of the forest conditions of such land which can be under:
taken none too soon. Furthermore, if that redemption clause were
repealed, it is more than likely that, very often, if not in most cases,
the tax would be paid, rather than allow the land to go to sale. The
county, at least, would then receive benefits from the change.

The whole question of taxes in relation to timber lands is as
important as it is anomalous. It may be briefly stated at the outset
that the only class of property which existing law compels an owner
to destroy in self-protection is timber. There are thousands of
acres within the limits of this Commonwealth which might have been
(in the interest of the State) in timber to this day, if uncertain pro-
tection against fire and certain demands for taxes had not driven the
owners to remove the timber. If it is true, as asserted, and as the
experience of those nations with which we must compare ourselves
seems to show, that a state must in its own interest have a certain
(variable) proportion of its area in timber, or suffer in lack of it,
then our laws defeat their own purpose by driving the citizen to de-
spoil rather than to strengthen the State. An illustration may be
worth more than any abstract statement, however clear or pointed.

In one of the interior counties of the State there was situated

7

a tract of land covered with valuable hemlock. For the purposes
of taxation this land was assessed at the rate of two dollars an acre,
then raised to four, then to six, when the owner protested. The fol-
lowing year it was assessed at eight dollars an acre. Protest made
was unavailing and the owner immediately put in mills, removed
the timber and allowed the county to take the land.

The plea for increasing the tax was that the township depended
on that land for the money to spend on its roads. What was the
result? Removal of the timber left no tax for the roads, and gave
the county a large area of unproductive land. It was not solely the
payment of the taxes which drove the owner to remove the timber,
but because after paying the taxes he had no protection against
the fires which the State allows to go, year after year, unchecked.
Here is the proper place to call attention to the fact that it is no
longer true that fire does but little damage in green timber. The
time was when it was practically true. That time has passed, for
in this State so large a portion is already bare of trees, barren and
sun-exposed, that evaporation removes the moisture from those areas,
and then from even the woods, until in seasons of ordinary summer
drought vigorous forests may be killed where they stand. One in-
stance of this, in Clearfield county, comes to mind now. Another
example was furnished three years ago in the southwestern part of
Wayne county, where a very valuable tract of hemlock, which was
specially guarded, was destroyed in spite of all the protection which
could be furnished. A condition so anomalous as this indicated
cannot endure in the larger intelligence of the near future. What
the remedy shall be is a question which merits, and doubtless will
receive, careful consideration from our legislators before long. It
will press for a solution.*

A most important problem presents itself for consideration,
namely, that of forest reservations. Strip it of collateral ideas and
the fact at the bottom of the whole question is—the State must,
have a due proportion of woodland. It is an absolute condition upon
which not only our prosperity but the very protection of the surface
of the State depends.

The first inquiry following this is: How can it be most surely,
speedily and economically produced, by the State itself directly own-
ing and directing the machinery, or by the State making it possible
for the citizen to do this?

While it is true that in Pennsylvania local conditions will make
it to the advantage of the Commonwealth that the citizen should be-
come a timber producer and ‘himself see that it was guarded from

aut = — ——

* By act approved May 25, 1897, there is allowed a maximum tax rebate of forty-five cents per acre
on not more than fifty acres to each farm property owner. providing there are fifty trees to the acre
which average eight inches in diameter at six feet above the ground.

8

trespass and from fire, it is nevertheless true that the State should
be the largest producer, because it has the largest interest, because
the century required to mature a crop of trees is as nothing to it,
but is disheartening to the individual, and chiefly because in the
land which the State should own there are involved possibilities for
good or evil, to every citizen, which are too vital to be trusted to
any man or to any set of men. :

The idea is not new to our people. It may be well to note how
far it has progressed and assumed the favor of a popular demand.

1st. The State Grange of Pennsylvania, in the last two annual
meetings, passed resolutions calling upon the Legislature to provide
State forestry reservations.

2d. The Maritime Exchange, of Philadelphia, has petitioned the
Legislature for State forestry reservations.

3d. The Board of Trade, of Philadelphia, has done the same.

4th. The Pennsylvania Forestry Association, with a membership
in every county in the Commonwealth, has joined in the request.

5th. The Engineer Club, of Philadelphia, has also asked for it.

6th. Almost every leading newspaper in the Commonwealth has
repeatedly, editorially and otherwise, joined in the general call for
State forestry reservations.

7th. Various leading industrial journals, such as the “Manufac-
turer,” have been outspoken in their demand that in their interest
and protection the State assume control of the high water sheds of
the Commonwealth, where the water power which they require is
produced.

It will be seen that already a most respectable following is earn-
estly asking the State to act in this direction.

If it were new or untried in this country, we might well pause be-
fore taking the initiative; but it is neither. The adjacent State
of New York has been the pioneer in this movement, and secured as
public property already a large portion of the Adirondack region.
The wisdom of the action was voted upon three years by the people,
and of all the constitutional amendments brought before that tri-
bunal for their sanction, the one measure which passed unchal-
lenged was that in favor of the State forestry reservations. Within
a month the question was again placed before the people as to
whether the State should allow settlements by cottagers of any part
of the forest reserve, and so anxious were the citizens to confirny
forever the safety of these reservations that they defeated the con-
stitutional amendment, which made an invasion possible, by the
largest majority (845,000) ever given to any measure, State or Na-
tional, in New York. It was most remarkable that on this issue
the average citizen and the largest manufacturing interests were in
perfect, earnest, working harmony. Almost every great newspaper

9

in the State called and kept calling upon the citizens to defeat the
proposed constitutional amendment. The threatened danger pro-
duced the most universal popular rising and protest which the Em-
pire State ever witnessed.

There must be some reason for this. Such things do not come
about by chance. It would be almost impossible to have produced
such an overwhelming sentiment by any party machinery.

The fact is that the cause of alarm sounded in New Hampshire
by the Hon. T. Jefferson Coolidge, was already working in New York.
It is worth dwelling upon.

I have been at the pains of verifying the following abstract which
is taken from the “Manufacturer,” Philadelphia, October 31st, 1896.
As I can neither condense nor improve upon the presentation, I sub-
mit it for your consideration:

FORESTS AND FACTORIES.

“In his annual report to the Amoskeag Manufacturing Company,
whose great mills are located at Manchester, New Hampshire, util-
izing, as those below at Nashua and Lowell do, the splendid water
power of the Merrimack river, the treasurer of the company, Hon.
T. Jefferson Coolidge, of Boston, stated some important facts con-
cerning the usefulness of the river for manufacturing purposes. He
describes first, the great freshet in the Merrimack, on April 16, 1895,
when the water rose to the highest point that until then had ever
been known, injuring the Amoskeag dam, and compelling extensive
and costly repairs. He then describes the terrific freshet of March
2, 1896, which rose 14 feet higher than even that of the preceding
year, and which compelled the stoppage of the mills, with their
6,000 operatives, for some time, and would have done immense dam-
age to the mills, had it not been for the strong repair construction)
of the previous year.

““T need not say,’ proceeds Mr. Coolidge, ‘what a terrible loss to
the city of Manchester such accidents are, and how desirable it is
to take any measures which may diminish the probability of future
and higher freshets. When you consider that the Merrimack has for
the past few summers been lower than in previous years, it is evi-
dent that some cause is at work turning the stream into a torrent
with long droughts and fearful discharges of water.’

“There is but one explanation, he further says of this phenomenon.
It is simply, ‘the cutting down of the forests around the headwaters
of the Merrimack, the Pemigewasset and other affluents. The woods
hold back the water and allow it to trickle slowly into the streams}

1*

10

cut down the woods and the rain running rapidly over the surface
of the ground, which is baked by the sun or frozen hard by the
winter’s cold, pours all at once into the streams, turns them into
roaring torrents, and finds its way all at once into the Merrimack,
Sweeping everything before it. In a few days the river sinks rap-
idly and becomes in time of drought an insignificant stream. Had
the forest been left, no sudden discharge of water would have taken
place, and all through low water, streams would have trickled
through the woods and swollen the Merrimack when it was low.’

“Remarking upon the experience of Europedn countries in this
matter, especially France, along the valley of the Rhone, by which
they were compelled to adopt stringent measures to protect the for-
ests along the rivers and their affluents, Mr. Coolidge proceeds to
point out the great seriousness of the subject to such a city as
Manchester, and such a state as New Hampshire. It is the power of
her rivers which gives New Hampshire its greatest importance. The
damage done, he declares, is already most serious, ‘and if this state
of things continues, manufacturing by the water power of the
Merrimack will become, in my judgment, impossible. No new mills
will be put up and the old ones will have to use steam, which places
them at a great disadvantage with regard to other manufacturing
cities where coal is much cheaper owing to less transportation. Our
coal has to be carried to the seaboard at Baltimore or Newport News,
transported by water to Portsmouth at a cost ranging from sixty
cents to $2 a ton, and taken by car to Manchester at an addi-
tional price of twenty-five cents for unloading and seventy-five cents
for freight from Portsmouth to Manchester.’

“The strength of such manufactories as the Amoskeag Mills con-
sists largely in their situation where nature pours over their water-
wheels, at the lowest possible cost, the power that moves their
spindles and looms. If these water powers are to be destroyed, such
industries will be practically destroyed. If steam must be used,
and coal brought from the distant mines, the condition will be revo-
lutionized. Compared with Falls River, Manchester is at a disad-
vantage of $1 a ton in the purchase of coal, and compared with mills
in the South, $2 a ton. ‘I appeal to you, gentlemen,’ earnestly says
Mr. Coolidge, ‘for the interest of New Hampshire, which depends on
the success of the manufacturing corporations situated on the Mer-
rimack and the other streams of the State, to exert your utmost in-
fluence to induce the next Legislature to protect the forests re-
Maining.’”

You will recognize that this most vital relation of the forests to
the water powers of the State is not new here. It was most fully
brought out by the Commissioner of Forestry and enforced by vho-
tographic illustrations at the meeting of the State Board of Agricul-

11

ture, held in Bethlehem in June, 1893. What gives, however, special
weight to it now is the fact that the statement above quoted is from
a practical man, with large business interests, and is his well
weighed, deliberate utterance, after the threatened danger had de-
veloped into an accomplished fact. Surely, it may be regarded as
beyond the dictation of mere sentiment, and as a timely and needed
warning to us. If the condition of things which Mr. Coolidge depicts
as existing in New Hampshire calls for State interference there to
protect the manufacturing interests, a similar condition here equally
demands that our State shall interfere to arrest the calamities which
have already threatened to wreck and injure the prosperity of an-
other State.

It may be taken for granted that in the near future Pennsylvania
will follow the example already set by the State of New York.

The question remaining is, how shall the land be acquired? It ‘s
in vain to hope that the Commonwealth will come into possession of
any area worthy to be called a state forestry reservation upon which
a mature forest now stands,:for such no longer exists within our
limits. Every such body of timber is reduced in size, and circum-
scribed by clearings. The very utmost that we can do will be to
secure the location and to produce the forest. We will be wise if
we obtain the place before we are obliged to produce the soil as well
as the trees. Even now it is probable that it will cost the Common-
wealth as much to obtain the naked, treeless area as it received for
the same ground when it was covered with timber, out of which for-
tunes have grown. It is quite clear that as the necessity of these
lands to the State become more and more real, they will be held
higher by the owners, even though each succeeding year has ren-
dered the soil more and more impoverished. Neither will there ever
be a time when the demand made upon the State Treasury will be so
light as to render the acquisition of the needed land easier than now
if they are to be acquired by exercise of the right of eminent domain
and subsequently paid for.

The state of New York acquired most of its present reservation
in the Adirondack (I believe), by sale for unpaid taxes.

This raises the question as to whether Pennsylvania might not
do the same. It is within bounds to say that there is a million of
acres within our limits upon which the owners now refuse to pay
taxes. Or to speak exactly, we may put it thus, that “in 1894, the
amount of land, seated and unseated, advertised to be sold for taxes
in the different counties of the Commonwealth, so far as heard from,
was upwards of 1,500,000, or 2,358 square miles.” These figures
come from lists furnished by county treasurers. This land lies in
great part within the limits which the Forestry Commission has
suggested as being suitable for State forestry purposes. One may

12

then readily see that if the State were to acquire title to all suchf
lands, but few years would elapse before either taxes would be paid
to the counties, or the State would be in possession of all the land
required for its forestry purposes. The chief objection to land so
acquired would be: It would at first be more or less scattered and
therefore relatively costly to protect and manage.

It is no longer a problem as to whether forest lands, under proper
State management, can, or should be, made a source of revenue to the
government. The magnificent results attending the forestry opera-
tions of Germany, Sweden and Norway, and England in India, leave
no doubt that no other line of public policy returns a surer or larger
revenue, involving at the same time less injury to the individual
or less loss to the government. That it can be made to pay here we
may infer from the prices which are offered to New York for spruce
grown under state protection.*

There remains yet one more aspect of this many sided question.
Communal forests are managed in Germany in local interests. To
adapt this statement to our own conditions it would appear as
though a county having a considerable area of land thrown upom
it by non-payment of taxes, might under judicious care and protee-
tion, in a comparatively few years, obtain a very large portion of
its needed revenue from sale of wood from such land. The whole
success of such an attempt would lie in honest, intelligent manage
ment; but it would relieve the citizens of the burdens of taxation
just in proportion as it was successful.

There are towns in Germany which have made themselves practi-
cally free from taxation by the sale of forest products. The fact is
an unfortunate commentary on the methods we have employed to
reach our present condition, as a State and as a Nation, that though
there will never come a time when our best kinds of timber will cease
to have a value, that the true Northern yellow pine (Pinus mitis)
has practically disappeared from our forests, and there is reason to
fear that in the very near future yellow poplar, black walnut and,
wild black cherry, hemlock and white pine will cease to have large
commercial value here, because of scarcity.

The report of the Forestry Commission has been so kindly re;
ceived and is in such demand that the edition will probably be
speedily exhausted. .

The Commissioner of Forestry proposes to prepare the following
papers as speedily as possible:

First. Report on Forest Fires.

*Since the above was written the Legislature has passed, and the Governor has approved, two acts
providing for State Forestry Reservations—one by purchase of a reservation of not less than 40,000
acres atthe head waters of each of our three principal rivers (act of May 25, 1897): the other by the
State paying the taxes on land sold at treasurers’ and commissioners’ sales for taxes (act of March 30,
1897. )

13

Second. Report on Walnut Tree, producing fruit with the outer
covering of the hickory nut.
Third. Report on the Engle Chestnut Orchard.
Fourth. Report on Some Troublesome Weeds.
Fifth. Abstract from Recent German Forestry Reports.
Sixth. The “Yearly Cut” of Timber in Pennsylvania.
Seventh. Forests as Soil Formers and Soil Preservers.
I am sir, with respect,
Your most obedient servant,
J. T. ROTHROCK,
Commissioner of Forestry.

(14)

COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA—DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE,
DIVISION OF FORESTRY.

Pig: eA NEOUS’ PAR ERS

ON

EO) Ro) eho i Reh

FROM

ANNUAL REPORT,

DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE

FOR 1896

Bid. Fe ROTHROCK. M.D;

COMMISSIONER OF FORESTRY.

TABLE OF CONTENTS.

Nelationion,HorestS to they Mariners |, i252. pre. tule cecum wn cla oes ei oe ie 17
Removal of the Fertile Soil from the Farm by Water, ............ 32
AS Walnut wreaks... a. Ot TED CL eer RIND ik AP en eer LeMay Bee 4I
Partial Abstract Statement of Timber Cut during the Vear 1896, in Penn-
SVN GTI perttenhe! oo aie tomieme calelret hotness ck Nici, cM cca ene” co ie DON HA we hoe cs 44
Partial Suramary of Timber Cut by Counties, : . 2... +... os te 46
ChestuutPossibilitiesimPennsylvaniays «a5. 04 6 os cae 8S cue e 47

slew OMVVICCUS Hames. gos. uli tne hon lapiae Sti SWISS EASE ce isak ok eet ce, Se So 5
Losses by Fire in Peansylvania in the Year 1896, so far as heard from, .... 54
(15)

(16)

RELATION OF FORESTS TO THE FARMER.

Nothing stands absolutely alone in itself and by itself. Every
created thing has its relations to other things and forces. Indeed,
the whole orderly procession of nature is the result of forces which
have become mutually associated and inter-dependent. It sometimes
happens that the most obvious purposes are in reality the least
important. The forests furnish a striking example of this. If asked
to name their uses the first answer would almost certainly be: for
lumber and fuel. Yet in the eternal scheme these are the very least
of all the important purposes they subserve, and the results of these
uses are probably the least enduring of all which spring from the
forests. To obtain these utilities the trees, as a living body, must be
sacrificed. They cease to operate as a portion of any natural plan
the very moment they become either lumber or fuel. Not only so, but
in serving either of these purposes they compete with substances
which, to a greater or less extent, could be substituted for them.
In such functions trees are in strong contrast with themselves, when
we remember that as living things their uses are unique, and that
nothing which they do for the rest of creation could be so well done
by anything else.

Without thought, we regard the earth as having been always tim-
ber-clad, until human energy opened the clearings in which crops
were to be produced. Such, however, is not the fact. All science is
in accord with the belief that forest trees, as we now know them,
are the end of a long line of plant life. When extensive areas
emerged from the waves to become dry land, and at length the abode
of human beings, nothing of higher form than a rock moss or a
lichen was there to represent the vegetable kingdom. Indeed we are
driven to this conclusion by many arguments, and by none more forci-
bly than by the fact that soil capable of supporting a large-sized tree
did not exist. There was no soft substance into which the roots
could penetrate to fix the trunk in an erect position, or from which it
could draw the needed nourishment, which the air failed to supply.
Our large trees won their hold upon the earth only after lichens,
mosses and ferns and palms had preceded and prepared the way for
them. Even then there remained ages upon ages during which we
should have recognized among the stately forms none of the familiar
trees of our own time. Whatever possibilities of lumber or fuel were
in the stick were to remain until the earth, largely through theagency

(17)
2

18

of trees, became fitted for its final occupant—man. Then, and then
only, almost as an afterthought, the possibilities of lumber and fuel
appeared. .

The object of this preliminary statement is not in any sense to
undervalue the importance of either lumber or fuel, for they are
most important portions of the foundation upon which human pros-
perity has been built, but to emphasize the fact that forests had a
history of development before there was a man upon earth, and that
they have been largely instrumental in preparing it for his home.

In further discussing this subject it will be convenient to con-
sider:

First—How forests came.

Second—What they have done in the past.

Third—What they may and should do in the future.

Fourth—Can they be spared?

1. How Forests Came.—Any conception of the early history of
our globe involves ideas which are strange to some persons and in-
credible to others. Briefly stated, however, the earth is regarded
as a ball which has cooled down from a molten or semi-molten con-
dition, and that in its interior there still remains a core of fire. Such
we assume to have been in part the history of the other bodies
floating around us in space. The process of solidification and cool-
ing was not only a gradual, but a very slow one. The first plant life
was probably in the water which collected in the depressions on
the earth’s surface. Later those gray, scale-like masses, which we
call lichens, or rock moss, appeared on the dry surface of the rock.
The reproductive bodies of these lichens are microscopic in size and
of the simplest character, so far as a structure is concerned. Cast
juosely upon the rock, any blast of wind might carry them away.
Indeed, many of them are thus transplanted. But they have the
power to dissolve the substance of the rock, form a minute nest for
themselves, such as befits their size, and then to produce threads, by
growth, which eventually unite with small green bodies, likewise of
microscopic size, and form a living crust on the surface of the rock.
The growth of such a lichen is exceedingly slow; and, therefore, its
life is correspondingly long. When, however, it does die, there is left
behind a thin stratum—the beginning of a soil—the nest in which
another lichen may begin an easier life, or where, possibly, some
plant of higher organization may appear. It is not to besupposed that
there was no other force at work in forming the first soil. The weight
of a falling raindrop may loosen a stony particle. Snow, when it at
length could remain on the earth’s surface; ice and frost each did
their share in rending the rocks, and in proportion as these solid
masses became smaller, the work of soil production became easier
and more rapid, because an increasingly greater surface was ex-

19

posed to the action of these disintegrating forces. Mosses in all
probability came later, grew along with the lichens, and dying,
added their remains to increase the bulk of that union of broken
down rock and vegetable matter which we call soil. Ferns and club
mosses, both of goodly size, sprang up where the lichen and the moss
had prepared the way. Palms succeeded these, and after a long
interval the familiar trees of eur own forest appeared upon the
scene,

Such, in brief, are the stages leading up to the forests which we
assume the right to destroy at will, as if blotting them from the sur-
face of a country could be effected without doing a most serious
injury to an order of events which had required vast periods of time
to mutually adjust

2. What Have Forests Done in the Past?—By this we mean be-
fore man appeared upon the earth, and apparently in anticipation
of his coming. The assertion has been made that a probable cause
of the disappearance of the luxuriant vegetation of the coal-forming
period was that the plants themselves had extracted so much of the
carbonic acid gas, or carbon dioxide, from the atmosphere that their
successors were no longer able to live. If that be so, then we may be
well assured that they were making the air, by so far, more fit for
animal life. The question, however, here is not as to the fact, but as
to the extent of its operation. There is not only no doubt whatever
that all plant life does make an atmosphere better fitted for us, but
that it is the most active known agent in maintaining that salubrity.
Most other things, living or dead, tend to abstract oxygen from, and
many, in addition, pour out carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. In
fact, so long as plant life is vigorous, active and engaged in increas-
ing the sum total of vegetable substance, just so long plants, and
our long-lived trees especially, are enriching the atmosphere for our
uses. It is only when they are flowering, fruiting or decaying that
this statement is reversed and a surplus of carbon dioxide given
off. Just here the special value of the trees becomes strikingly ap-
parent. In them decay is usually long postponed. The flowers are
but a small proportion of the surface of the tree, and the maturing
fruit is even less. The preponderance of the healthful agency over
the noxious becomes at once clear in this light.

Hills and valleys are produced in two ways. By the one process, as
the crust of the earth cooled it contracted on the central core. The
diameter of the earth is decreasing with each successive age, just
in proportion as the loss of internal heat allows it to contract. The
outer crust (upon which we live) wrinkles, as it contracts, as an
apple does, when, from evaporation, it parts with the moisture con-
tained under the skin. These wrinkles on the earth’s surface, which
appear so vast to us, are the mountains and the valleys. Taken,

2U

however, in the measure of the earth’s diameter, they are ridicu-
lously small. If you bad a globe eleven and one-half feet in diam-
eter, a raised line one-sixteenth of an inch high upon it would about
represent the height of our mountains to the diameter of the globe,
and the one-thousandth of the thickness of that tiny line (equal to
one-sixteen thousandth of an inch) would approximately represent
the depth of the surface which we know as soil, and with which we,
as food producers for the rest of the earth’s population, have to do.

If these folds, or ridges and mountains, did not exist, the earth’s
surface would be a monotonous plain, practically everywhere equally
distant from the centre of the earth, except in so far as that dis-
tance was modified by the differences between the polar and the
equatorial diameters of the earth. Our streams would flow slowly--
in the Northern hemisphere toward the northeast, and in the South-
ern hemisphere toward the southeast, and the large masses of
water would gravitate to the poles, as those would be the portions
of the earth least remote from the earth’s centre. The continental
land masses would tend to be in the equatorial diameter of the globe
because the land there would be the highest, i. e., most distant from
the earth’s centre.

The introduction, however, of these shrinkage folds, which we now
recognize as mountains, completely changes these relations. Water
will flow downward along the lines of least resistance, and as it flows
will wear away the soil first and the rock next, in exact proportion,
other things being equal, to the rapidity of its flow. We see this in
the washes on our hillsides and in the constantly changing courses
of our stream channels. But other things are not equal. If they were,
the tendency to the formation of ravines and gulches, by erosion,
would not exist, and everywhere over an equal slope the wearing
away of the soil would proceed evenly, and the unbroken character
of the country would in great measure be preserved, or more properly
speaking, the tendency to an even reduction of our mountains would
everywhere exist.

As it is, vast discrepancies in the character of soils and rocks
occur; some yielding to erosion by flowing water more easily than
others—and it is along such lines of least resistance that currents of
equal velocity carve out their valley channels to the ocean, following,
of course (in most instances) the trend of the larger valleys made by
the folds in the earth’s crust.

The one factor which is potent in giving character to the earth’s
surface, and which we can indirectly control, is the rapidity of the
water flow. Under natural conditions, in a timbered country, the
normal tendency of the water would be to the least rapidity of flow,
because of the hindrances afforded, directly and indirectly, by the

21

trees. This fact has been well put by Professor Shaler.* “In a single
day a tilled field may lose from its surface more soil than would be
taken from it in a century of its forest state.”

The above opinion is unquestionably true. The principle is, to put
it in the words of Major Raymond, of the United States Engineer
Corps, “as well established as any other in physical science.” Since
then it is so important, it is worth a consideration in detail. Briefly
the proposition may be thus stated:

Forests by retarding the rapidity of the water flow tend, in so far,
to prevent the washing away of the surface soil, which is one of the
most important elements in agricultural prosperity.

The expression, “pelting of the storm,” is no mere figure of speech.
Those who have felt the weight of a falling rain-drop in an open
country will readily recognize that it brings with it a positively ap-
preciable force. If careful observation is made where the drop falls
on the earth, it will be noted that it has loosened the soil and made
a miniature excavation. The water of the fallen drop immediately
dissolves (at least in part) this loosened soil and begins its journey
downward. Careful observation will also show that in an ordinary
uncovered space, each drop does an appreciable work—if the soil is
at all soft. The aggregate of the fallen drops produces the inunda-
tion. The aggregate of the soil so removed produces the muddiness
of the stream, whether that be very marked, or the contrary. In
other words, the muddiness of the flowing water is the measure of
valuable, soluble soil removed from the country. It is mostly soil
in condition to be used in one way or another by those growing
plants which we denominate crops and in whose abundance we find
the reward of our labor.; If that soluble portion of the surface of the
earth were infinite, or more exactly, if the most fertile part of it,
which the plants most need, were inexhaustible, we could contem-
plate its removal from our fields calmly. But instead of being
abundant, there are but few places on the earth’s surface where there
is enough of it to enable the farmer for any considerable period to
pursue his calling without impoverishing his land, unless he takes.
active, costly measures to restore it. The farmer does not create that
fertility. Whether it comes to him through the medium of his barn-
yard, or by purchase as an artificial fertilizer, he is simply using
over and again the old elements which he has transported back to his
tilled acres. Hence the wisdom, the actual imperative necessity of
holding on to that fertility by all possible methods. This, however,
is not all. The increased rapidity with which water drains out of a
treeless country is a prolific cause of disaster, not only to those parts

area Vt ee ed oe ei ee eee
*Aspects of the Earth, p. 275.
+The word soluble here is used not in its chemical sense; but in the sense
commonly accepted—i. e., the particles of soil are held suspended in the water.

22

whence the flood came, but to those into which it flows. Every small
stream furnishes an example of this. The severe dashes of rain which
were So common during the past summer in countless instances over
the State, visibly, palpably, before our eyes, washed the finest, best
soil from our fields, where it was needed, into the public roads
where it lay first as mud and then as dust, to the detriment of
travel. The ordinary brook, unless it be so narrow that every shower
flushes and scours it out completely, will show that the sediment
from higher up has clogged its course, and what has taken place in
this small way is repeated on a grander scale after the tributaries
have become confluent into a main channel. The delta of the Nile,
and in our own country, the delta of the Mississippi, alike are made
up of soil which has followed the course of the river from a greater
or less distance to its final destination—the tide water; and silt and
soil of the same quality which clogs the channels of the streams above
the tide water is mostly fertility on its way to the tide level. Let me
again quote from Shaler, 1, e. p. 275: “Brief as has been our use of
the American land, a perceptible portion of it, probably as much as
one-hundredth part of the tillable area, has been reduced to a state
of destitution which it will require ages to repair—which indeed is
scarcely reparable by the hand of man.”

Not only are these facts well known and proven, but the laws gov-
erning the rate of water flow requisite to transport material of dif-
ferent sizes can be clearly stated. Thus, in the upper part of the
stream bed where the water flows as a torrent, massive rocks may
be driven before the flood. Lower down as the current slackens its
pace the rocks will have been left behind and simply pebbles will be
found; and still lower, where the water flow has been reduced in
speed to that of an average river, the wash will be simply sand and
soil. The figures startle us, but no less authority than Dana has
quoted from Humphrey’s and Abbott’s report the statement that in
an average year the Mississippi carries to the Mexican Gulf an
amount of silt equal to 812,500,000,000 pounds. This would cover
241 square miles evenly one foot deep. Geikie (Great Ice Age, page
315) states it thus: “Then again we have to bear in mind that the
whole surface of the country is being subjected to the abrading action
of running water. Under the influences of rain, soil is continually
traveling down from higher to lower levels; rills and brooklets are
gouging out deep trenches in the sub-soils and soil rocks; streams
and rivers are constantly wearing away their banks and transporting
sediment to the sea. The gravel and sand and silt that pave the
numerous water courses are but the wreck and ruin of the land.”

It is then, under this view of the case, most important for us to
bear in mind that of all the substances essential to successful, contin-
uous cultivation of the earth, the one thing most difficult to restore

23

is this soil, and that the one agency most uctive in reproducing it,
and most valuable in restraining its waste, is the forest cover to the
land.

If this were the only function of the forests it would be ampk
reason for throwing around them every protective care which was
not inconsistent with their legitimate uses for lumber and for fuel.
It is, however, but a part of what they accomplish. Not only do they
mechanically restrain the destructive force of the surface water, but
by that very act they give it a better chance to soak into and sat-
urate the adjacent earth. The downward pointing roots furthermore
serve as lines along which, with increased facility, the water pene-
trates to the depths beneath, where it is safe from immediate evap-
oration, and where it continues (possibly for mcenths) to nourish the
smaller streams ard to maintain the perpetual flow of our springs.
It is further to be observed that this water so saved is in immediate
proximity to the smallest rootlets, and is by them absorbed, taken
up through trunk and branches to the leaves, where it is evaporated
or transpired into the open air. In this flow upward from the earth
it not only carries the nutrient matters of the soil, to form the
fabric of the tree, but it returns in the form of vapor, to moderate:
the temperature, a quantity of moisture which might well seem fab-
ulous. Thus it has been estimated by Dr. Evermayer that a beech
tree “fifty to sixty years old would transpire about twenty-two
pounds of water daily.” Multiply this bv four or five hundred trees
and that by the number of growing days in the vear and the immense
volume of water which an acre of forest land may furnish through the
leaves of the trees is at once apparent. Such an acre would restore
to the atmosphere during the six months, from April Ist to the last
days of September, about one thousand tons of water by evapora-
ticn and transpiration from the leaves, and in the same basis a square
mile would furnish 640,000 tons of water, or reduce the number of
trees one half, and each square mile during the growing season
would return, to the air, over 300,000 tons of water.

It has never been shown that this tremendous volume of water,
filtered out from the earth to the clouds, through the trees, actually
increases rainfall over the region. But it does bring the atmosphere
there, by so much, nearer the point of saturation with moisture, and
just so much less water from other sources is needed to load the air
with moisture enough to cause a downpour of rain.

There is, however, a relation of the utmost importance to the
humidity of the country, in which forests play a large part. It is
in preventing, directly and indirectly, the rapid evaporation of
moisture from not only thesurface which they cover, but from even the
surface of the streams themselves, as well as from the areas under
actual cultivation. Every pound of water restored by the trees to

24

the atmosphere is a check upon that dry condition which results in
parched earth, and the general dry condition which we have so ex-
pressively denominated “drought.”

But even here the end of the forest usefulness has not been
reached. Coming from above downward, the heat from the sun pen-
etrates our atmosphere readily, and during the day accumulates in
the earth more rapidly than it escapes. This constitutes a safeguard
which the farmer seldom has fully appreciated. Allow this heat to
escape and the surface of the earth to become reduced to, or even
near to the temperature of surrounding space, and it would mean de-
struction of most of our crops. It is the heat of the sun which ig
stored in our earth that prevents this reduction in temperature, and
it is the moisture in the air which holds this life-preserving heat for
our benefit. In this respect the value of the forests as producers of
watery vapor is simply incalculable.

The network of 1oots descending from tree, shrub or herb, renders
the earth more porous, and to a certain extent produces a sieve-like
condition, by means of which the water percolates to the depths
below.

We have not yet alluded to the mere mechanical action of the dead
leaves in retaining moisture as they strew the forest floor. A very
simple experiment will make all this quite plain. Take a basket of
leaves in the autumn, just as they have fallen from the trees, weigh
them and note the weight. Now place that same basket, with the
same contents, out where the snow of winter may fall upon it and
melt, as the spring advances. Then weigh it. You will be surprised
at the increase of weight. Yet it is caused solely by the water which
the leaves have retained. Now, instead of limiting this experiment
to a surface of a foot or two, imagine the effect of such a collection of
leaves extending over miles of forest floor, and the vast importance
of even the dead leaves appears. Every pound of that water, too, is
acting as a protection against the dry condition of the atmosphere
which prevails during a drought. The leaves, however, have not only
been gathering moisture themselves, but they have first aided in the
safe storing of the surplus water beneath the earth’s surface, and
then they have been the most efficient agent in preventing the loss
of that water by a rapid and premature evaporation. Furthermore,
as these same leaves decayed they have furnished carbon dioxide gas
to the water, as it trickled down into the earth, and to a very
marked degree aided thus in the dissolving of certain kinds of rocks
into the condition of soil.

This vista of the usefulness of the forest to the farmer is endless.
It is endless simply because the order of things existing in nature
is the result of forces operating through almost endless years, until
each has become adapted to the other. The touch of the human

25

hand when it removes the forest covering, to a certain extent, disar-
ranges this established order. It is unavoidable, nay, it is necessary
for human well-being that this should be disarranged; but to effect
the change in a hasty, destructive manner, without regard to the
operation of any natural law, is but to invoke here the disaster
which has already overtaken other nations. On page 261, of “Aspects
of the Earth,” Professor Shaler has in his usual clear style portrayed
some of the consequences: “The most serious misfortune connected
with the reckless destruction of the forest arises from the loss of the
soil from large areas of land, by which regions naturally fertile have
been converted into deserts of irredeemable sterility. Already a
large part of many fertile regions has been sterilized in this fashion,
and each year a larger portion of this infinitely precious heritage
of life slips into the rivers and finds its way to the sea because we
have deprived it of the protecting coating of vegetation.”

We may now briefly consider what the forests may and should do
for us in the future.

First of all, the forests should continue to do for us in the future
all that they have done in the past—that is, in so far as their de-
creased areas will allow that to be possible; but they should do
more than this still. They should be made the active agent in restor-
ation of fertility to acres that have already become so unproductive
that they will no longer compensate the farmer for his labor upon
them.

Mankind, and especially we of this Western world, are still young
in our relation to natural laws and but half awake to the impending
results of violations of those laws. It is true that in some of the
earlier seats of civilized’ power, deserts have taken the place of fer-
tile fields, and that want exists in the very regions which once were
the granaries of great nations. The connection between cause and
effect is plain enough when attention is called to it. It is hard, how-
ever, to induce the individual to make a personal application of even
the plainest lessons. We have not yet reached the point as a people
of recognizing that we are responsible for the prosperity of those
whom we have begotten, or that at least we have no moral right to
leave the world in a worse condition for the support of our children
than we found it for ourselves. We have, in full justice, but the
usufruct of the lands to which we hold the titles.

This all applies, with full force, to the manner to which we impov-
erish our hill lands by slovenly farming and then abandon them to
the descending rains and melting snows, until they have passed first
into an unproductive condition and then into that of a desert.

If there is any one statement which, among the farmers is more
common than another, it is that “farming don’t pay.” Of course
upon even that point opinions may differ, and much may depend

26

upon how the farming is done. It is quite clear that farming cannot
continue to pay upon land which is constantly becoming poorer.
There must, under such circumstances, come a time when it will
cease to be remunerative and then perforce must be abandoned. It
is absolutely true that at this very hour a very considerable por-
tion of our State bas already reached this deplorable condition. In
the nature of the case we cannot say just what the proportion is, but
it would probably be safe to say that at least one-tenth of our
cleared area has ceased to be remunerative under any ordinary
system of agriculture. Furthermore, almost every acre of this land
is becoming worse. This condition has become a pressing practical
problem, which rises beyond the domain of politics, and into that
of statesmanship. Whatever else may be doubtful, it is absolutely
certain that no state can continue to be prosperous if its population is
increasing and its resources decreasing. The only promise such a
condition makes for the future, is want, increased severity in the
struggle for food, and political unrest. The only effective measures
of relief must be based upon a restoration of those unproductive
acres to a productive condition. We are limited, too, in the diree-
tion that these measures take, for they must involve a minimum of
expense with a maximum of good results.

Thus far we know of but one method by which this can be done.
It is to restore all such land to a timbered condition. This proposi-
tion is radical, possibly ahead of the times, but it is true neverthe-
less, and in the experience of men will appear more and more true
each succeeding year. It is therefore the height of folly to ignore it.

The one practical question is, how can a change be brought about?
This involves two ideas. First, What can the individual farmer
do? Second, What should the State do? In what follows it is to
be understood that we now speak solely of land which has been
farmed and become impoverished, or which has for years at least,
been considered part of a farm holding, even though it ‘has never
been cleared. We do not refer at present to those larger areas from
which the lumber has been removed and which have been aban-
doned, without care, to the yearly forest fire. Such lands demand
a separate consideration.

First, what can the individual farmer do? If he derives no
revenue from any lands for his labor he can, at least, wisely suspend
unpromising labor upon them and devote his time to something
which promises remuneration. This is simple, ordinary sense, and
any man may be supposed to be capable of appreciating the argu-
ment. He could also, at nominal cost, encourage the growth of
forest trees upon them. There are thousands of acres in this Com-
monwealth which were once fields, but which are now covered with
a growth of young, thrifty yellow pine. There is ‘hardly any land

27

so poor that white poplar would not thrive upon it, and in a brief
period producing a remunerative crop of pulp wood. Even Ailantus,
which will grow almost anywhere, gives promise of coming value as
a lumber for the cabinetmaker. The cost of these trees as a first
growth is almost nothing. Meanwhile they would form shade and
soil in which other, more desirable trees, would grow. The essen-
tial fact to bear in mind is that on land which yielded nothing, and
was becoming poorer, fertility, under forest conditions, is increas-
ing, a crop of some value is being raised, and almost no money or
labor is expended. The gain, however small, is on the side of the
farmer, or land owner. Furthermore, this gain promises, if the
business is wisely conducted, to become greater each year, because
of increasing scarcity of wood and increasing demand for it. It
must be remembered that new uses are being discovered for wood
faster than substitutes for it are found. But if such a plan is to
succeed, fires and cattle must be kept off of the ground. Ultimately
we shall, on just such land, come to plant chestnut, locust, various
oaks and white pine. Indeed, once the first growth or protective
cover is formed,.a day in autumn devoted to dropping acorns,
chestnuts and locust seed, in shallow holes, and then giving them
a Slight covering of earth and leaves, would more than likely show
results which would surprise the planter. These, however, are de-
tails which cannot be considered in this connection.

To meet just this condition of affairs the State has wisely enacted
the following law:

AN ACT

For the encouragement of forest culture, and providing penalties
for the injury and destruction of forests.

Section 1. Be it enacted, etc., That in consideration of the public
benefit to be derived from the planting and cultivation of forest or
timber trees, the owner or owners of any land in this Common-
wealth planted with forest or timber trees in number not less than
twelve hundred to the acre, shall, on making due proof thereof, be
entitled to receive annually from the commissioners of their respec-
tive counties, during the period that the said trees are maintained
in sound condition upon the said land, the following sums of money:

For a period of ten years after the land has been so planted a
sum equal to ninety per centum of all the taxes annually assessed
and paid upon the said land, or so much of the ninety per centum
as shall not exceed the sum of forty-five cents per acre.

For a second period of ten years, a sum equal to eighty per
centum of the said taxes, or so much of the eighty per centum as
shall not exceed the sum of forty cents per acre.

For a third and final period of ten years, a sum equal to fifty

28

per centum of the said taxes, or so much of the said fifty per
centum as shall not exceed the sum of twenty-five cents per acre.

Provided, That it shall be lawful for the owner or owners of the
said land, after the same has been so planted for at least ten years,
to thin out and reduce the number of trees growing thereon to not
less than six hundred to the acre, so long as no portion of the said
land shall be absolutely cleared of the said trees;

And provided also, That the benefits of this act shall not be
extended to nurserymen or others growing trees for sale for future
planting.

Section 2. The owner or owners of forest or timber land in this
Commonwealth, which has been cleared of merchantable timber,
who shall, within one year after the said land has been so cleared,
have given notice to the commissioners of their respective counties
that the said land is to be maintained in timber, and who shall
maintain upon the said land young forest or timber trees in sound
condition, in number at least twelve hundred to the acre, shall, on
making due proof thereof be entitled to receive annually from the
commissioners of their respective counties the sums of money men-
tioned in the first section of this act: Provided, That the first
period of ten years shall be counted from the time that the said
land has been cleared of merchantable timber, and, that after the
said first period of ten years, the number of trees upon the said
land may be reduced as in the first section is provided.

Section 8. Any person or persons who shall wilfully or carelessly
cut bark from, or otherwise cut, burn or injure any tree, plant, shrub
or sprout planted, growing or being on any land in this Common-
wealth, without the consent of the owner or owners thereof first
had, obtained, or who without such consent, shall kindle, or cause
to be kindled, a fire on any forest or timber land in this Common-
wealth, or who shall carry into or over any forest or timber land
any lighted candle, lamp or torch, or other fire, without having the
same secured in a lantern or other closed vessel, or who shall dis-
charge or set off fireworks of any kind on said land or among the
trees thereon, or who shall wilfully or carelessly burn or fire upon
his or their own land, or that of others, any tree, brush, stubble or
other combustible material whereby fire shall be communicated to
the leaves, brush or timber upon any forest or timber lands belong-
ing to other parties, shall be subject to a penalty not exceeding
one hundred dollars for each offense committed, with costs of suit:
Provided, That if the defendant or defendants neglect or refuse to
pay at once the penalty imposed and costs, or shall not enter suffi-
cient bail for the payment of the same within ten days, he or they
shall be committed to the common jail of said county for a period
of not less than one day for each dollar of the penalty imposed:

29

And provided, When the penalty imposed is above five dollars, the
defendant or defendants may enter into a recognizance, with good
security, to answer said complaint on a charge of misdemeanor,
before the court of quarter sessions of the peace of the county in
which the offense is committed, which court, on conviction of the
defendant or defendants of the offense so charged and failure to pay
the penalty imposed by this act, with costs, shall commit said de-
fendant or defendants to the common jail of the county for a period
of not less than one day for each dollar of penalty imposed.

Section 4. Any justice of the peace or alderman, upon in-
formation or complaint made before him by the affidavit of one or
more persons of the violation of this act, by any person or persons
shall issue his warrant to any constable or police owicer to cause such
person or persons to be arrested and brought before the said justice
of the peace or alderman, who shall hear and determine tbe guilt
or innocence of the person or persons so charged, who, if convicted
of the said offense, shall be sentenced to pay the penalty afore-
said.

Section 5. The commissioners of each county shall, within one
month after the passage of this act, cause the same to be published
one or more times, in one newspaper of general circulation in their
respective counties.

Pamphlet Laws, 1887, p. 287.

As this paper deals with the relations of the forest to the farmer,
it would be out of place to introduce the wider bearings of State
forest reservations. There are, however, most important connections
existing between the State, the farmers and the forests, and it is
proper that they should be more fully understood. For example,
one may assume that so long as a forest stands on a portion of a
farm it is doing a public service, because of its relations to the at-
mosphere and the rainfall. In fact it would usually be hard to
show that the owner derived any more benefit from his standing
timber than the citizens generally did. He, however, pays all the tax
upon it. Indeed, during the financial stress of recent years, the
owners have frequently been obliged to remove the trees in order
to realize something from land upon which they were paying money
out. This may seem incredible, but it can be proven. In other
words, in self protection, the farmer was driven to remove forest
growth, which, under existing circumstances, was actually of more
value to the Commonwealth than the taxes paid upon it were. Clear-
ly there must be something wrong with legislation which drives a
man to impoverish the State! It should also be remembered at the
same time that forest property is the most open to damage by in-
truders, and yet as a matter of fact, though taxes are paid upon it,
the State practically accords it, now, no protection. The injustice of

30

this whole system of forest taxation (on farm land) is so plainly
recognized by the farmers that repeated attempts have been made
to remove it from the list of taxable property.

It is clear, however, that it would be unconstitutional to exempt
it from taxation wholly. It is not named by the constitution amony
the privileged classes of property, and therefore must for the present
remain subject to tax. That there may be no doubt upon this point,
we quote Article IX, Sec. I, of the State Constitution:

“All taxes must be uniform, upon the same class of subjects,
within the territorial limits of the authority levying the tax, and
shall be levied and collected under general laws; but the General
Assembly may, by general laws, exempt from taxation public prop-
erty used for public purpeses, actual places of religious worship,
places of burial not used or held for private or corporate profit, and
institutions of a purely public charity.

“Section 2. All laws exempting property from taxation, other than
the property above enumerated, shall be void.”

There is, however, a most hopeful alternative. That the power ex-
ists to classify property for the purposes of taxation is clear from the
wording of Article IX, Sec. I, because the expression, “class of
subjects,” is used therein. That this power belongs to the General
Assembly of the Commonwealth seems to be equally clear. See
discussion of this subject by J. Carroll Hayes, attorney-at-law, Re-
port of Department of Agriculture, 1895, Part IT, p. 39, et seq.

Such classification in real estate is already made, “as seated lands
and unseated lands.” Paxson, J., in Wheeler vs. Philadelphia, 77
Pa. 349, writes: “Thus, timber lands, arable lands, mineral lands,
urban and rural, may be divided into distinct classes, and subject to
different rates.”

It would appear to be possible to place farm timber lands in a dis-
tinct class and then, without wholly exempting them from taxes,
subject them to a minimum rate. Jt should further be urged that
this measure of relief is of vastly more importance to the State than
it is to the land owners. It is merely a question whether it is more
economical for the Commonwealth to grow and maintain that due
proportion of timber land which science, observation and history have
shown to be requisite for the continued prosperity of its citizens, or
whether it cannot (in part at least.) be done to greater advantage by
the land owners, if the State will make it possible for them to do so
without pecuniary loss to themselves.

The fourth and last point remaining for discussion may be briefly
disposed of, i. e.:

Can we afford to do without forests? It is a safe axiom of
political economy that no State can afford to do without anything of
value which it can produce almost without cost, on ground that is

31

capable of producing nothing else. It may furthermore be affirmed
that the rule is no less applicable to the individual land owner than
it is to the State. In other words, neither State nor individual can
afford to allow resources to remain unutilized. This idea admits of
a wide discussion; but we content ourselves with a mere statement
of the principle.

The farmers of Pennsylvania, in common with other classes of
citizens, may now witness the passing of two great industries which
still are, or but recently were, largely developed within our limits,
i. e., lumbering and tanning. Whatever diminishes their importance
here will increase the cost of our lumbering and tanning products.
It is furthermore worthy of remark that the producer can do, as
he has done in the past, shift the scene of his operations and still
conduct a profitable business; but the consumer located here must
pay the additional cost of transportation. These industries give
steady, remunerative employment to thousands of men who demand
our farm products and whose wages pay for them.

In short the Pennsylvania farmer can no more afford to do without
tbe forests which crown our high lands and mountain sides, and are
a part of the farm areas, than he can afford to do without timber,
without soil renewal, or without a constant, even supply of pure
water.

If we remove, without restoring the forests on the otherwise un-
productive lands of the Commonwealth, we cannot expect to escape
the evil effects which always follow when the long-established order
of nature has been suddenly violated.

REMOVAL OF THE FERTILE SOIL FROM THE
FARM BY WATER.

In a brief paper elsewhere in this volume the writer has stated in
general terms the relations between forests and the soil of farms.
This article is intended to present some inore detailed and practical
suggestions upon the same subject.

Just how valuable this soil is which is washed away from our
cultivated acres will appear from the following statement made by a
gentleman who was well-known in Pennsylvania and recognized ag
one of our most wide-awake farmers. The late Colonel James Young,
of Middletown, was asked at a meeting of the State Board of Agricul-
ture, what fertilizer he derived the largest returns from. He re-
plied promptly, that in the winter he kept men employed cleaning out
the bottom of the canal, which ran through his land, and that he
thought this paid him better than any form of fertilizer he could use.
In short, he said, that it was about the most profitable industry on his
farm. Colone] Young was simply gathering up the wash from his
own land and from that of others, further up stream, and restoring
it all to his own land. It was a far-sighted, legitimate enterprise,
one which was an example of the application of common sense to -
farming. It also converted his productive farms into object lessons
for the rest of the community.

Just how great the volume of this fertile soil wash is very few
persons have any idea of. Usually it goes on and attracts but little
attention. Unless it in some way becomes conspicuous by its un-
usual amount, or by becoming a nuisance in the form of mud or
dust in our roads.

The illustration accompanying this article is one, however, out
of many which might have been had this summer. The space in-
cluded within the dark lines shows the location of such a wash,
and to a certain extent its volume. The history of that pile of fer-
tility (indicated by the lines aforesaid), is this: Last summer, it was
observed that the corn field above the road, having an average slope
of probably three degrees, was badly washed after each heavy
shower. The loss of soil was very apparent. The field was in corn,
and of course its surface was loose. Over the whole surface, obser-
vation showed, there had been a general removal of material, which

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33

was the best, because it was the most *soluble, and therefore best
adapted to the uses of the growing crop. This soil had also, in each
depression, been worn out more deeply because the water had there
gathered into small rivulets or streams, and its erosive power was
greater along such lines. Finally, this soluble soil found its way
out of the field and into the edge of the road, where it lay during most
of the summer in a condition alternating between mud and dust. If
the soil which had been washed away from that acre of good land,
in a single season, had been placed on one of the many impoverished
acres of the Commonwealth, it is probable that there would have
been enough of it to have produced a fair crop. As it was, instead
of being a source of benefit to the land owner, it had become more
or less of a nuisance to the traveling community. In the autumn
this material was gathered up (wisely enough) to be replaced upon
the field whence it came. It is worthy of note that in the woods ad-
jacent (visible in the illustration,) there is almost no sign of wash.
The rain appears to have been either wholly absorbed, or its tlow
so held in check that it was incapable of doing any damage on wood-
land ‘having that same degree of slope. Its damage upon the same
field, if it had been in sod, would have been vastly less than it was
on the plowed field, but it would, probably, have been considerably
greater than in the woods.

Another instance of the effect of wash it may be worth while to
give here. In traveling through a very beautiful valley in the cen-
tral part of Pennsylvania, it was observed that portions had but
recently been cleared of the trees. There were signs of abundant
crops on the ground from which the stumps had not as yet
wholly disappeared. On the other hand, where the land had been
longer under cultivation the yield was scanty. The solution of this
was easily reached when the wash from the field into the road was
observed.

The question is sometimes asked why a ridge top, or a portion of
a hillside near the top, remains fertile so much longer than the
ground just at the foot of the hill. Instances, or alleged instances,
have recently come to my notice. The fact is not hard to understand,
though the same explanation will not always answer on the same
spot. Time is an element of the problem. For example, when the
land is first cleared, that portion which is highest, whether it be the
top of a hillside or a level table-land, can receive no considerable
volume of water from any higher point. On the table-land an im-
mense proportion of the rainfall goes into the ground. The de-
composing rocks below the surface renew fertility as fast as it is
washed out on the surface. The same is true of the top of the hiil-

*Not soluble in a chemical sense, but capable cf being suspended in and car-
tied by water.

3

BE

side. Each foot, for example, carries but little more water than fell
upon it. Neither rain nor melting snow have had time or chance to
gather into a torrent with great eroding power. The land at the
bottom may be in one of two conditions. Before it was cleared a
small quantity of fertile soil, humus resulting in great part from
decomposing leaves, had gradually been carried down the slope
above and been arrested at that point. Hence, as a rule, the foot of
the hill in a wooded condition is more fertile than the higher por-
tions. This is clearly shown by the product being larger and more
vigorous. This condition of affairs continues after the clearing has
been made for a varying period of time, the length of which will de-
pend upon the conditions. Sooner or later, however, the land at the
foot of the hill becomes at least as unproductive as that above. The
reason of this is obvious. The water which flows from the top of the
hill flows with an ever-increasing velocity as it descends. It has
but little force when it starts, but gathers strength and erosive
power as it reaches the bottom. The result is inevitable. Not only
is the soil which was accumulating while the wood remained on the
ground removed, but beside this, the original natural surface goes
with it. Surface impoverishment goes on more rapidly than soil
formation does below, hence results a greater sterility on the lower
grounds than those of the plateau, or of the hill top. Or to state
the same idea as is more generally done, the top of the hill has be-
come richer than the foot and the lower part of the side.

The present condition of a very large portion of the steeper re-
gions of the State is already in a deplorable condition. The north-
ern tier of counties is within the belt once covered by glaciers. Or
perhaps it would be better to state that the signs of glacial action
are most marked there. Such regions, as Prof. Shaler has weli re-
marked, do not suffer severely from washing out of the elements
of fertility, because “owing to the depth and loose aggregation” of
the materials deposited by the ice masses, a large part of the water
soaks into the ground. It is, therefore, quite as likely to increase
the quantity of material fit for plant food as it is to remove it.
When, however, we study the counties which make up the southern
half of the Commonwealth, a different condition of affairs is at once
visible. The traces of glacial action are less plain and signs of soil
impoverishment are correspondingly more common. Even in such
counties as Chester and York, which, on the whole, possess a vast
agricultural wealth, there is probably a larger acreage of land so
impoverished, that it cannot be counted upon for a crop, than there
is in Susquehanna county. The unpleasant truth had _ better be
stated that Pennsylvania possesses a vast acreage now under a nom-
inal system of agriculture, which is falling lower each year in the
scale of productiveness, which gives no promise of future agricul-

35

tural value, and which should, with the least possible delay, be re-
stored to a forest condition. The steep, shaly ridges within our limits
which have but little natural productiveness, which impose upon
the unfortunate who attempts to farm them an extra labor and cost
to maintain them in a remunerative condition, and even then very
frequently fail to answer to even moderate expectations, are ex-
ainples.

It may be well here to quote a general statement from the “Kco-
nomic Aspects of Soil Erosion,” by Professor N. 8. Shaler, whose ob-
servations upon this point have been careful, long-continued, and
have extended over wide areas. “Owing to the fact that in North
America generally the rainfall is apt to have a torrential character
(the precipitation taking place at a rate which is not common in
- Europe) and to the fact that these downpours are likely to occur on
ground which has been loosened by the frost, our soils are exposed
to a measure of danger much greater than that which menaces the
fields of the Old World. There appears to be but one way by which
we may meet this danger—this is by limiting the work of the plow to
those fields which have a degree of slope so slight that with proper
tillage they may not be exposed to scouring action. Although this
classification has to be made for each district and species of soil, it
may in general be said that no field which has a greater slope than
five feet vertical in one hundred feet of length should in any country
be exposed to the danger which ordinary cropping inflicts. Areas
from this measure of inclination upward to thrice this rate of slope,
or to a maximum of fifteen feet in the hundred, may reasonably be
plowed in order to bring them into the state of grass lands, but
should not be tilled more than is necessary to retain them in this
state. All areas having a slope of more than fifteen feet in one hun-
dred should by the rules which the conservator of the soils is dis-
posed to lay down, be devoted to forests which afford the only crop
that can be harvested from such ground without a swift and imme-
diate loss of fertility.”

There remains for consideration the other aspect of this problem;
i. e., the effects of the wash upon the land where it may be arrested.
If this soil so deposited is fertile the land receiving it is a gainer.
If, on the other hand, as often happens, sand, stone and pebbles are
deposited upon the lower land, the effect is most destructive. This
latter condition seldom occurs except where deep gulches have been
worn out of the hillside above, and where the water flow has as-
sumed the character of a torrent. In this country land lost to culti-
vation by the overflow of sand and rocks is not large in area. Cer-
tainly not, at least as compared with certain districts in Europe.
For example, we are reliably informed that the “French government
and the farmers together have spent during the last thirty

36

years over $40,000,000, and expect to spend three or four times that
amount to reforest 1,000,000 acres of denuded mountain sides, the
soil and debris from which have been carried by the torrents of water
into the plain covering over 8,000,000 acres of fertile ground and
making it useless for agriculture.” Still it is important enough here
to merit our consideration. °

How may the damage already done be repaired? This resolves
itself mainly into filling up the gulches worn into the hillsides and
bringing the areas overflowed by the deluge of debris into a fit con
dition of farming purposes. The latter part is simply to remove
surface stones and add fertility enough to secure a crop. This, how-
ever, is subsequent to filling up the gulches, as if done before the
wash was arrested, it would simply be labor lost. The important
part of the problem then is to arrest the water flow in the gulches.
Attack an enemy in his weakest point. In the case of water flow it
is where it begins. In hilly regions, where such washes are most
frequent and most damaging, there is usually an abundance of stones
which may with advantage to the farm, be gathered and dumped into
the upper end of the gully, thus lowering the point at which the
wash begins, and to that extent lessening the destructive force of
the flowing water. Every foot thus gained at the upper end renders
the task easier.

There are, however, extensive gulches in which such direct, unaided
1epair would be an immense task. We must make the torrent itself
expend its power in repairing the damages it has caused. In France
and Germany this has developed almost into a science. The thing
aimed at is: First, to check the velocity of the descending water, and
second, to arrest permanently the soil which the water carries down-
ward with it. AJ} such soil (or stone) is thus deposited where it will
do the best service. To accomplish these desirable objects the course
of the ravine is partly filled at various points with brush, which is
held in place, that it be not washed out, by weights such as stones,
logs placed transversely to the course of the gulch and firmly fixed
in position. It requires no explanation to understand how so simple
a device as this may both retard the speed of the water and encourage
deposition of the earthy matters which it carries. Furthermore, the
water ‘will flow in all ordinary times through the interstices. The
undermining process in the sides of the deepest part of the gully are
largely arrested. This allows chance to further bind the bank by a
growth of willows or such species of shrubbery or trees as will grow
most promptly in the location. When willow brush can be obtained
in a living condition and so placed as to be in contact with a moist
soil, they may be expected to grow, and as they ascend out of the
depths of the ravine, to not only hold soil but to constantly rise above
it, by growth.

37

On most farms there are found a greater or less quantity of old
rails. These placed lengthwise in the ravines, and held in place by
stones thrown over them, often answer a good purpose.

How to prevent soil washing. This is of infinitely more importance
than how to repair damages. It is more than doubtful whether as a
people we are in a proper frame of mind to profit by the experience
of other nations. It is unfortunately true that we shall probably
go through the most costly process of gathering our own knowledge.

There are several principles involved in presentation of soil wash-
ing. It would at first appear impossible that the hardest, most
compact soils are those in which destructive, deep washing occurs.
This, however, becomes clear when one remembers that on such sur-
faces the water flows on top, with but little to arrest its speed, and
consequently with little to diminish its destructive power. On the
other hand, if the soil be loose and porous, and especially if it con-
tains much vegetable matter, it has a large capacity for absorbing
water, which slowly percolates away beneath the surface. The un-
derlying principle here, then, is to secure a porous soil, and all the
better if that porosity is gained by the roots of living plants, which
produce also a strong cohesion in the mass of earth.

When ground much given to washing is plowed for the purpose of
cropping, straw is often placed in the furrows, to be covered at the
next round of the plow. This is a simple, time-honored method of
singular efficiency.

Underdraining by the removal of surplus water increases the
capacity, in times of heavy rainfall, of the soil for absorbing and
holding water. This again diminishes, or often almost wholly pre-
vents, destructive surface wash. It is well known that soils which
are well limed are less apt to wash than those which are not.

There are times when these methods of preventing soil washing
are, alone, wholly ineffectual and must be abandoned or used in con-
nection with other methods. Among which are:

(a) Furrows or barriers which run over the field, as nearly as pos-
sible, horizontally. This slackens the speed of the water, diminishing
its erosive power on the one hand and allowing increased chance of
absorption (of the water) on the other hand.

(b) The formation of terraces, whose sloping surfaces (at least)
may be in a dense sod, and whose flat parts may be cultivated or not,
as happens.

(c) Planting belts of trees in the horizontal direction along a hill-
side. This allows a chance for the formation of an absorbing layer
of humus and of Ieaves, which will aid the roots in changing the sur-
face flow to one of underground character.

(d) Most important of all—giving up to growth of trees all such
soil as is likely to wash or to involve considerable expense in pre-

Dx
>

38

vebting it. The successful application of this principle sometimes
involves considerable skill and thought. The land to be forested
may be in the condition least suited for such work. It may be poor,
dry and sun-scorched. It may even be that no tree of value could at
first be induced to grow on it. We may even be glad to secure a
luxuriant growth of weeds as the first product at sucha place. Nev-
ertheless, all such places can be reforested, if one is careful first in
the selection of his seed, and second in doing every step of his work
thoroughly. .

How shall we proceed? First of all, select an area no larger than
you can properly prepare and care for. It is quite possible that if~
the seeds to be sowed were placed on the ground when the frost is
coming out, that the alternate freezing and thawing of the surface
would bring them into close contact with the soil, as is the case with
clover seed, and that many of them would grow. This method, how-
ever, is but an apology for what should be done. The ground should
be broken up, if possible. If it cannot be done with the ordinary plow
then it should be done with the primitive shovel plow. A good subse-
quent harrowing will tend to even up the surface and to further re-
duce the clods. Bear in mind what we are now seeking is the first
tree covering, something which will afford protection to such trees
as we desire ultimately to plant for their useful properties. We
must, therefore, be willing to sow what will grow. Locust is
always a valuable timber. It flourishes on almost any kind of soil
and is much less apt to be bothered by the borer when planted in
clumps or in quantity, than when it stands as an isolated tree, or row
of trees, by the readside. The ill-odored Ailantus, while in small de-
mand now, promises in the future to have a value as furnishing wood
for the cabinet maker. It has the supreme merit of thriving under
neglect and of growing on almost any soil. The Catalpa tree (either
the Eastern or the Western form) grows vigorously on a certain class
of soils. It is, however, not adapted to every location. If the soil is
fertile and moist there is but little doubt of its success. If, on the
other hand, it is sowed in a clay soil over a limestone rock, the
chances are not in its favor. Still it is so easily obtained that it may
be well to include it in the present list. The wood is valuable for
fence posts.

These seeds may all be planted in early spring—the locust after
having received a good preliminary soaking in hot water to soften the
outer shell, and the Ailantus and the Catalpa after having been
dampened over night to waken them up. The introduced white pop-
lar has the habit of growing on almost any soil. Moreover, when
once started, its tendency to self multiplication is wonderful. This
tree produces its seed in early spring, and even if not in time to plant
with the seed, already indicated, would have a fair chance of success

39

in at least a moderate degree if sown broadcast on the ground subse-
quently. Its seeds are light, and provided with a silky down which
enables the wind to carry them to great distances. It is suggested
that mixing these over night with damp sand and sowing the whole
(sand and seeds) together broadcast, would obviate the danger of the
seeds being carried off the ground by wind.

How shall they be sowed? That depends. First of all, in large
quantity. Your immediate object is to secure shade and leaf litter
and a penetration of the earth by the roots. These conditions having
been acquired, the rest is easy. If sowed broadcast, as would be de-
sirable on the soil we are now considering, a subsequent harrowing
would cover the seed and increase its chances.

Such a plantation, once started, would require thinning out very
soon, else it would develop into the thicket condition, which so far as
prevention of surface wash was concerned, wonld be effectual enough,
but it would not give the best promise of a crop of valuable timber.
It should not be necessary to suggest that browsing animals should
not be allowed access to such grounds. ‘Their presence would be fatal
to any successful forestry operations. Fire of course would be disas-
trous. The method just described is simply a slight improvement of
the natural plan by which we so often see old, abandoned fields
covered with a fresh forest growth. It has, however, this advantage
that the growth is more likely to be prompt, dense and desirable. It
is to be understood that the chief use of such a forest is to serve
as a protection to more desirable trees, which may be introduced by
methods already well understood.

There is another class of land, which, though no longer remunera-
tive under ordinary agriculture, is still better than that we have just
described, and which it may be desirable to cover as speedily as
possible with a forest growth. The preparation of the soil here may
be more thorough. And while the same broadcast methods of sowing
may still be resorted to, it is by no means certain that they should be.
Having some choice in the matter, it may be wise to secure a more
orderly arrangement of the trees, not only because greater protec-
tion against wash is thus obtained, but because a better quality and
a larger quantity of timber is secured. Indeed, it may be a question
for the landowner to decide whether he will sow the whole surface
by seed, or whether he will raise his seedlings in a nursery and then
transplant them in the soil he desires to reforest. Such soil also
admits of a larger list of seed which may be sown with fair promise
of success: Elm, two or three species of ash and red maple may be
added to the list already named for covering the ground speedily.
And as the season’s growth is more likely to be vigorous, the sowing
may be longer delayed, or done, indeed, when the seeds ripen—from
June to October. It may be suggested that in company with these

40

seeds there can also be a light sowing of such leguminous plants as
will not only give protection to the tender trees, but will at the same
time rapidly add nitrogen to the soil; i. e., field peas, and, certainly
for the southern half of Pennsylvania, crimson clover. It should be
stated that the locust tree is a nitrogen gatherer, and therefore adds
to the fertility of the soil.

The other alternative to sowing is by placing the seeds in rows.
This is probably on the whole better adapted to the weightier seeds—
the nuts and acorns for example.

The methods to be employed for each kind of seed have been fully
discussed in the report of this department for 1895. It will, there-
fore, be unnecessary to repeat them here.

If trees are raised in a nursery and transplanted the task is much
less formidable than supposed. Three men, or two men and a boy,
can plant by means of a “dibble” from three to four thousand such
young trees in a day. The same instrument may be used in planting
cuttings, or such seeds as require a considerable covering of earth.

To recapitulate, the two sovereign remedies against “wash” on a
farm are, first, a dense, well-matted sward, which should be kept in
good condition by frequent top dressing, or if this fails, a prompt
restoration of land rendered unproductive to a forest condition.

pom

| Sy hee tle] ip Gee EEN ES si

|
WALNUT TREE
Producing Fruit Externally Resembling the Hickory Nut.

41

A WALNUT FREAK.

In the winter of 1895, my attention was ealled by Mr. William H.
Groninger, clerk to the commissioners of Juniata county, to a re-
markable fruit produced by a walnut tree near Pleasant View post-
office, in the county above named. The statement made in connection.
with the tree was that it was a walnut tree which produced hickory
nuts. :

Mr. Groninger handed me the fruit for inspection. Naturally
enough I was cautious about expressing an opinion concerning so
remarkable a production as the one held in my hand. It was appar-
ently a black walnut, which retained its outer hull, or husk, in a
wrinkled or weathered condition. I noticed that its free or upper
end showed signs of splitting into valves, after the manner of the
ordinary hickory nut. The other end, on which the point of attach-
ment to the branch was still visible, had the texture, color and odor
of the walnut, and of that only. The nut itself was unmistakably a
walnut.

On April 16th, 1896, Mr. M. 8. Esh was kiud enough to take me to
see the tree. It stands within a few minutes’ walk of the railroad
station known as Warble, on top of a low ridge, or hill, and within
half a mile of the mountains on the southern side of the Tuscarora
valley. The tree was about forty feet high. The trunk was two feet
seven inches in diameter at four feet from the ground. The illustra-
tion will show that it had in earlier days received severe injury. On
the one side, toward the west, was a scar much more than « foot
wide above, tapering down several feet to a point. It seemed as
thoug» one of the largest limbs had been torn off there by a storm.
On the side toward the south, apparently an earlier and more ex-
tensive injury had overtaken the tree. The illustration will show
that it extends in one limb from above where the primary branches
arise to the ground, and that it involves the entire heart of the
trunk. The general belief is in the neighborhood that it is the result
of a stroke of lightning. This I am not inclined to doubt. The tree
is old and seems to grow but little. The statement of Mr. W. D.
Beale, a middle-aged man, who grew up (I am informed) on the farm,
was that the tree seemed to have changed but little in appearance or
size as long as he can remember it. At the time of my visit (April,

42

1895) the ground was abundantly strewn with the weathered fruit
of the previous season. This fruit was probably half of the usual
normal character, and presented no apparent difference from the
ordinary black walnut, either in its outer husk, or in the nut and
kernel. The other half of the fruit which lay on the ground presented
in a more or less marked degree on its outer husk the split character
of the hickory nut. The valves sometimes were barely indicated at
the tip. At others they were clearly marked to the middle of the fruit
or even lower still, but never quite to the base. The nut itself in
every instance was a genuine walnut.

On leaving this freak my first thought was that it must be a hybrid.
This, however, cannot be the case, because the tree bears fruit of
no constant character. Part is normal and the remainder is of the
character indicated. There remains now to be stated that, which to
my mind, is the most singular fact of all in connection with the his-
tory of the tree; i. e., its fruit not only varies on the tree in the
same year, but one year’s product appears to be no certain sign of
the character of the fruit on the following year. For example, the
fruit of 1895 was, as has been stated, about evenly divided between
the normal character and the sport. The fruit of the season of 1896
was almost, if not quite, wholly normal. Atleast I failed to find any
pronounced instances of the sport in the fruit when I visited the tree
in October of this year. There was at the time an abundant crop of
fruit lying on the ground, and the only indication I was able to ob-
serve of any departure from the normal state were two fruits which
bore faint longitudinal ridges toward their apex.

So far as I am aware, no demonstrable solution of this singular
biological problem is to be had. Still there are certain facts which
pGint to a possible explanation.

It is clear that a tree so maimed as this one cannot be regarded
as in a healthy condition. Leaving out of sight the fact that it is
practically a mere shell, there remains also the still more important
fact that one-half of that shell is destroyed,and that if the limbsabove
receive full nourishment it must be through a much diminished sur-
face of cambium and young wood. That nutrition is seriously im-
paired might probably be inferred from the remark of Mr. Beale, that
he has known the tree all his life, and that it has changed but little, if
any, during that time. Its growth is, therefore, exceedingly slow.
There is another fact to be considered as pointing toward though not
proving the explanation about to be offered; i. e., the season of 1895
was one of phenomenal drought, and the abnormai fruit formed about
fifty per cent. of the yield of that season. The summer of 1896 was
more favorable, and there was but little shortage in the rainfall.
During this season the fruit was practically wholly normal. May it
not be a case of arrested development due to impaired nutrition?

pas

.

TRUNK OF WALNUT TREE

Which Produces Fruit

Externally Resembling the Hickory Nut.

s.
Lene
€&
/.
<r
zN
oN
we
x
7,
bean
er

WALNUI HUSK.
Dividing like that of the Hickory Nut.

43

If this is true, it would probably also lead to the conclusion that the
typical black walnut (Juglans nigra) is biologically higher than any
of the species of hickory (Carya) and that the former may be consid-
ered as a development from the latter.

An effort was made to ascertain when the tree was injured and
whether any connection could be traced between the injury and the
appearance of the abnormal fruit. No information of positive char-
acter upon that point seems to be obtainable.

The leaves do not seem to differ in any essential from those or-
dinarily found on the walnut tree.

44

PARTIAL ABSTRACT STATEMENT OF TIMBER CUT

DURING THE YEAR 1896 IN PENNSYLVANIA.

To Hon. Thos. J. Edge, Secretary of Agriculture:

Dear Sir: It is by Jaw made the duty of the Secretary of Agricul-
ture, “as far as practicable, to procure statistics of the amount of
timber cut during each year, the purposes for which it is used and the
amount of land thus cleared as compared with the amount of land
newly brought under timber cultivation.”

{ have, under your direction, instituted such inquiries as were pos-
sible, to comply with the above requirement.

About fourteen hundred circulars were sent out to the lumbermen
of the State. Replies have been received from about half of them.
It is unfortunate that some of the largest operators are conspicuous.
by absence of statistics from this report. We can only say that
these figures represent in brief the information which we have re-
ceived up to December Ist, 1896, and that a very large proportion of
the timber cut remains unreported to us. This is the more worthy of
regret, because it prevents such a showing to the public as would
without injury to anyone, probably hasten legal relief and protection
in which the lumbermen themselves have the largest financial in-
terest.

The brief period elapsing between the close of the year and the
appearance of your report makes it impossible to secure all the in-
formation desired. It is therefore suggested that our reports here-
after be considered as extending from June 1st of one year to the
same date of the following year.

It is proper that I should add, I am indebted to Mr. Robert 8.
Ccnklin, clerk of the Forestry Division, for collection and prepara-
tion of the statistits used in the following table. It has been no
slight task, and his zeal and fidelity are worthy of commendation.

There still remains a large body of information in our hands upon
this subject which would be well worth publishing later in some pop-
ular form.

It is with regret that we announce there is as yet, so far as we are
informed, no determined, practical, intelligent effort at timber
restoration on a large scale in this State, except by the directors of
the Philadelphia Trusts, who have instituted a measure of rational

45

forestry on the lands in their care located in Schuylkill and Centre
counties.

There are some other examples of careful forest protection, in the
face of great danger, from forest fires. As a conspicuous instance we
may point to the land owned and managed by General Paul Oliver,
in Luzerne county.

It is in vain to expect any extensive tree planting or true forestry
until the State will offer the owner some real protection against
forest fires, or, in ether words, until it is made by law as heinous an
offense to fire a forest as it is to fire a barn.

[ am, sir, with great respect,
J. T. ROTHROCK,
Commissioner of Forestry.

46

PARTIAL SUMMARY OF TIMBER CUT, BY COUNTIES.

Kinds of Timber Cut, in Feet,

Board Measure. e

Lo)

ye ae ae a =

ro)

he | °

ao .

County. | z a =

| | } ®

| 5 | re; $ 7)

| 2 = g

% é B “

Bs | & 5 Fs E

< Ay q ° Q
Allegheny, <c<sccceces ainuidelye solee lene BOG 1 Secimiacisentenes ale Se sie'siewecin eine 883,000 | .cccccccccsese
PAPINSUTON Es cisice'niseisis siera'eale wwee eutenre : 525 244,000 650, 000 1,740,000 647
BOAver, ..ccccccccccccccccccveseccscoe: 159 in cmeeincieless.0 «| eoccccccccrece 140,000 |...ceeeeseren.
Bedford, scedsicateibeareaens 684 175, 200 12,000 1,102,300 » 330
Berks, .... Soli tise cacPenluccveces iene es 831, 000 312
Led hb oy Mier 1,480 80, 000 625, 000 1,325, 000 14
Bradford, <ce«ccosse 1,47 720,000 7,027, 000 1,765,000 2,618
BUCKS oss wires os P S19 dawecwesaiconiete mil wstowiselee telee 1,495, 000 165
Butler, antes 280! | Sevceamr sesaelens's Dawies we 1,025,000 |..00.cccccsess
Cambria, es 3,925 100,000 16, 345, 000 2,070,000 6,150
Cameron, 2,558 150,000 27,317, 844 100, 000 15, 760
Carbon, 65 80, 000 335, 000 340, 000 75
Centre, 5,093 11, 736, 000 3,210,000 3,394, 000 8,575
Chester, AOA Trea siet edulis sis Ole eves welea 1,124,000 200
Clarion, 1,689 11,025, 000 3,504,000 1,928,000 912
Clearfield, 14, 785 10, 974,000 94,080, 000 8,166,000 34,513
Clinton, 2,734 6, 978, 000 6, 285,000 4,466, 000 5, 823
CONINDIAS Suseivees. cues emeeceest te 350 885, 287 170, 000 391,000 480
Gra wLond,. <scles: ssamenewee aakinieale sees 519 10,000 2,335, 000 4, 289, 000 935
Cumberland, ......se... eieusees Aas 196 BO; 000" asics cciseceee 900, 000 250
IDaAUpiin; \wccccsscivendeccawe clues sesame 270 200; 000: seesscccsee ae 3,468, 000 213
DELAWATC, — sa:dceinic nin cu vevuc ew ee cess weiisaunbane sahara ee aeattl ceVrnar widisiee @ us cle oniee 83, 0005 ccncinteicieses.s
Rilie: I cceerceseccuciccees sui ameses aces 24,768 2, 835, 000 *’3i0, 560, 842 4,290,000 168, 402
rien ees soss pausneecaee ceca vevectass BSG) wisss-cecuntes ea 1,510,000 1,302,000 264
Fayette, ..0....06 siete s Suisletssai sia i chetniote 325
Forest, ° 66, 296
Franklin, 725
Fulton, Weitere sss! siere eee
Greene, os sSeenpeoetee es
Huntingdon, 264
Indiana, ..... Ssinisies sia lue.e(els\s 8,53
Jefferson, ...... 26,690
Juniata, .... 400,000 675, 000 330
Lackawanna, ....... aialcat oh serie aoa Fs 660, 000 270
LARcaster, ..cccecscccsece eensien esate . eorccees cece 120,000 ccscuessswasns
TUR WEENCO, «sisnsecicosiceden saqeicbisewes se ie we! ase Saleiwetas esis 25184; 000: \ccesccceecwene
Lebanon, ..... ness eee ceecos eatataceds 1, 800, 000 100, 000 4)
Mehigh >. wrisevess cess resis oc eecseccces weevcecccens 935, 000 245
Luzerne, ..... see acs eas BAe setecces 498, 000 817,000 462
Lycoming, ....... AT Cee Seiaiale 3,185 24,880,000 2,099, 000 14, 351
McKean, ..... Saldaiveleles aseistieieioeee 6,240 . , 200, 7,470, 000 23,798
Mercer, .. eee | cr BIG) essewscdiewewe canscwe Sieieieeieie Si1G4, DIT! tircoacmes teases
Mifflin, ... eacbabececuresse = s'sheets 1,765 ; 300, 000 1,750,000 1,190
Mcntgomery, vepee Sine vemnssees oe eee 90 ae's Mais svsdetessoas 150; 000s siscescs cesses
BEONTOE, s5.ce.cceveseccsss= seco es wee geeeeet ewe eevee 2, 180,000 100
Montour, eet Secenametrens Pelee Sacer seuenceu ee ae 150, 000 50
Northampton, .....ccccesscccsesess ee wee eb eceseccercs . 150, 000 100
Northumberland, ......e.-sseceseee me 200, 000 215, 100 120
IRONY iy Pcsscaessarcaecesceccscesle-scnive 1,747 120, 000 1,905,000 957
PIC. cece wastewedes sana wea euise ces 11,110 760, 55,000 1, 414, 000 130
PPORtOr a timicuis cwisa'se eciols Saecteec coeeeee 6,304 1,225,000 220,805,000 4,485,000 36, 640
Schuylkill, ..... aie sien: e)e, vib.s ag’ e1Gi= <1 Cle 370 670,000 1,300,000 630,000 385
Snyder, ..... edie wh esac stelees ¢encusiesion 2,147 5,970,000 12,000 978,000 3,083
BOWMOCrsOt tac cdedecncecevececs scm cveee 4,249 914,500 2,550,000 15,620, 000 3,348
Sullivan, = 3,120 384, 000 45,381, 500 3,866,000 19, 269
Susquehanna 675 100, 000 4,365, 000 745, 000 1, 980
Tioga, ... waee os 3,857 505,000 26, 621,000 1,110, 000 17, 831
MIMI ON, We eliescisvicsccs cvevicsciieccive 1,060 2,925,000 230,000 1, 402, 000 365
Venango, — ....- moeiiedeene enceiceete 360 300, 000 1,100, 000 1, 060, 000 455
Warren, ..... satgmeaeeeacc see Sc icue we 3,100 8, 820, 000 18, 039, 000 7,970,000 6,647
WaShINZtON,,. ..cccsceses. monte siee deste TIO Se evens Vahoseers secant 1,124;000 | 5 Svcicsseaesces
Wayne, ....... piceiesiaceseanioslae meee 686 260,000 985, 000 4,200,000 6065
Westmoreland, ..........00- Peaceerer 2,887 | ..csccee-ees Pr 000 = 2,513,000 800
WW VOMUNE ince ccc siwciccbes ccscceeies we 849 1,030, 000 | 3,708, 500 2,900, 000 3,149
WiOTK<) j scnsapecess sce celbauiisiense eee e ° 155 20, 600 | sees eeeeeeees 920,000 | 330
Motals, Besos sethessiens-ecss™ 140,150 | 113,921,279 |1,062,762,380 | 153,742,349 . 486,289

47

CHESTNUT POSSIBILITIES IN PENNSYLVANIA.

In the year 1803 Malthus published a work which inculcated the
idea that it was necessary a considerable portion of mankind should
die prematurely in order to keep the human population within the
limits which the earth could sustain. It may be true that in the
distant future such a doleful condition will be regarded as the nat-
ural and necessary one, but it is in the very distant future. The fact
is, we are barely on the edge of our agricultural possibilities. By far
the largest yields of the earth in the way of food supply await in-
creasing knowledge and necessity.

To illustrate—it is fair to estimate that there are upon this globe
not far from one hundred and fifty thousand species of flowering
plants. On the one hand, the human family uses for food out of
this vast host not over four hundred kinds. On the other hand. we
know that but a small proportion of the remainder contains any poi-
sorous or noxious properties.

It is fortunate that upon so important a question we are not left
to conjecture. There are positive facts we can draw upon to sup-
port the statement that we are only on the edge of our possible food
resources. For example, the island of Jamaica is probably no excep-
tion to the majority of tropical islands in its fertility. It would, if
reduced to a square, be only about seventy miles each way. Yet,
after feeding its own population, it sends into the markets of the
world about nine million dollars’ worth of fruit annually. A speedy
and regular ocean service has made this fruit so commonandso cheap
in this country that we are fast coming to regard it as food rather
than as a luxury. Now, with all the capacity for food production
in that island, we must remember that of all the food products
which Jamaica to-day exports, the great bulk comes from plants
which are not native to the island, but are introduced there. Its
native flora furnished the greater part of the means of support to
the large aboriginal population prior to the period of discovery, but
is almost wholly unutilized now. I might say it is forgotten. It
awaits rediscovery.

Again, it is a fact which history will confirm that civilized man,
so far as he has derived his food from the land, has done so almost —
entirely from the more fertile areas—at least deserts, with rare ex-
ception, do not, or have not, supported a dense population. It must,
however, be remembered that there are plants with wholesome,
abundant farinaceous seeds which are especially adapted to thrive on

48

just such abandoned areas. The family of plants to whieh the weed
known as “lamb’s quarters” belongs is of this character and some
of the seed products have been utilized by the Indians from “time
out of mind.” We have, furthermore, every reason to think that
those plants are capable of as much and as speedy improvement in
quantity and in quality of fruit as any of our other grains.

There is a most important practical application of these state-
ments. With these facts before us, with the real food-producing
power of a host of plants, native and foreign, absolutely unknown,
what right have we to confine ourselves to a few standard grains,
and then failing to derive the old time revenues from them, give up
With the despairing cry that “farming don’t pay?” There are many
things, once done at a profit, that don’t pay now. The successful
man in such an emergency seeks for something in his line of work
that will pay. If a farmer, he looks about him for a new crop. It is
to this point that we have been leading.

A walk through our cities during the autumn and early winter
will show that large quantities of chestnuts are roasted and sold
ou the important corners. It will be observed that all of these, or
nearly all, are of the large kinds which we collectively call Spanish

chestnuts. It is impossible to give an exact estimate as to the quan- -

tity which are so sold. The suggestive fact is that most of them are
imported. Is there any reason why they should be? Rather, is
there not every reason why they should not be? Already a well-
established market exists for more than we produce. There is every
reason to think that the demand for fine chestnuts would increase
as it has for fine grapes, fine oranges and fine mushrooms. It is the
invariable law that increase in demand comes with improvement in
quality. The mere fact that prices fall to such an extent that what
at first is considered as a luxury becomes later to be regarded as a
food, enlarges and steadies the demand and usually removes the
product from an extravagant to a business basis.

These remarks are suggested by a recent visit to the “chestnut
orchard” of Mr. Henry M. Engle. The hillside, which, from across
the Susquehanna, fronts the town of Marietta, is the scene of his
operations. It will probably be admitted by those who notice the
place from a distance that any. ordinary agricultural operations
there are out of the question. It certainly will be allowed by those
who climb the rocky slope that its only natural production is the
growth of timber. Mr. Engle found it covered with a growth of
thrifty chestnut trees. These he cut down and allowed sprouts to
arise from the stump. When the sprouts were a year old, into the
best of them, he placed grafts from the Paragon chestnut. His ob-
ject being to graft a whole head of the sprout at one time. Of course
this implied as a subsequent operation keeping down all lateral

49

branches below the graft, which was usually inserted at about two
to four feet from the ground. Mr. Engle has, I believe, employed
both whip and cleft grafting, but prefers the former. His methods
involve no departure from rules well known and long practiced, ex-
cept perhaps a little more care. The percentage of successful grafts
will probably be somewhat smaller than on the ordinary fruit trees.

The rapidity of growth of a graft on a sprout from a_ well estab-
lished root is simply amazing. Fuller, in “The Nut Culturist,” page
79, speaks of such a graft (under his observation) which made dur-
ing the first season a length of sixty-five feet when the main stem
and the lateral branches were counted. It all came from a single
bud.

A diameter of four inches is no unusual thickness for a paragon
graft of as many years, on a thrifty sprout. In that time it may be
expected to be in good bearing. Professor Heiges reports that
when he visited the chestnut orchard of Mr. Engle, “trees grafted
two years had as high as 35 buds, averaging three chestnuts per
bur. Trees grafted four years had upward of 500 burs, by actual
count.” It is to be remembered that this was on ground capable
of producing no other crop. This seems to be the proper place to say
that when the chestnut timber has been cut and the sprouts started
which are to produce such a crop of nuts, that if notice be given to
the county commissioners within one year of the date of clearing of
an intention to reforest the land, that the owner is entitled to a
small State bounty for each acre, by act of June Ist, 1887. (See
Pamphlet Laws, page 287; see also Report of Department of Agri-
culture, Part II, 1895, Forestry, page 28.)

The price of such nuts as the Paragon chestnut will of course vary
for each season. This year, in November, the writer paid for half a
bushel at the rate of seven and one-half dollars a bushel.

It may be fairly doubted whether it is best to attempt growing
chestnuts for market on this plan—that is on the forestry basis.
Will one not obtain a larger yield of large, sound fruit if the trees
he isolated (or at least not in close clumps) and the ground beneath
them kept clear of leaves and underbrush? This inquiry is suggested
by the fact that such trees are less infested by fruit-destroying in-
sects than those in forests, and furthermore, that where the ground
can be kept clean and clear of underbrush, one has a better chance
of destroying a large percentage of worms which would become the
insect parents of the following year’s worms.

Whether or not we could hope for an effectual protection against
these pests if all diseased chestnuts were promptly collected and
burned is yet a question; but there can be no doubt that such sys-
tematic destruction of the infested fruit would speedily decrease the
quantity of fruit injured. There are early and late broods of chest-

4

50

nut worms. It would probably be wise to gather the fruit as soon
as possible after it is ripe and keep it in a damp, cool place, whence
all worms and diseased fruit could be removed and promptly de-
stroyed.

It is unfortunate that as described above, land otherwise worthless,
can be made to produce a valuable crop of chestnuts after we have
realized one profit on the timber. It would, however, be very unfor-
tunate if it were supposed that such land only should be used for
chestnut culture. The fact is that it might be made even more profit-
able to raise chestnut trees from the seed and graft them with the
variety we desire to raise, and allow these trees to stand where they
had room to spread and where they could be under our immediate
care. The yield of some such mature trees is fabulous. I have in mind
one tree, about seventy years old, still in its prime, with many years
apparently ahead of it, which in one season bore thirty-six dollars’
worth of fruit, besides what was used by the family of the owner.

The relative hardiness of the Paragon stock as compared with the
native wild chestnut may yet be probably regarded as not wholly
settled. It seems necessary to repeat most positively the well known
truth that no one should plant Paragon or other large variety under

the impression that the resultant trees will produce fruit of a like

size. If such happens it will be unusual. Grafting is the only
method of certainly securing the special quality of fruit desired.
Though it is to be remembered that even failure to raise trees which
will produce fruit like that from which the trees came may occa-
sionally, rarely indeed, produce an even better fruit. Hence trees
grown (ungrafted) from the nut should be carefully studied. They
may become the parents of valuable varieties. On the whole, it might
be. considered a promising venture for one to plant our native chest-
nuts where you desire them to stand, on cleared but waste land, and
subsequently graft them with such a variety as the Ridgely or the
Paragon. The Scott chestnut is said to have great merit. Among
its good points it is claimed to be early bearing and to have a re-
markable freedom from insect attacks.

There is one point especially worthy of mention; i. e., that occa-
sionally a variety with new and sterling qualities springs from our
eommon wild chestnut. There are some such instances which are
well known, for example, where the fruit was of exceptionally large
size and matured very early. Such a combination of qualities would
be sure to find a sale, especially if added to them were the character-
istic of hardiness.

How to keep chestnuts safely over winter for spring planting is
by no means so easy as some would have us believe. It requires
judgment, and I had almost said skill, even when it is remembered
that when the essential conditions of success are to keep the nuts

51

from moulding in the autumn or early winter, to keep them damp,
but uot wet, and to keep them cold, avoiding sudden changes of
temperature as much as possible. Mr. Fuller gives in his book on nut
culture very exact directions. Take only sound nuts. Provide a box
with a bottom pierced with small holes, which are to be covered with
a bit of pottery. Put a layer of chestnuts on a layer of “moist,
sharp sand” which is an inch deep. Then another layer of sand, and
on top of this another layer of chestnuts, and so on. Then cover with
sand two inches deep to allow for settling. Cover box with wire
netting or strips of board to keep the mice out. Bury the box in
fome well-drained place in the ground, covering it with a foot of
leaves. Some friends of mine scrape away leaves from under a tree,
place the nuts on top of the ground and cover them with leaves and
leave them until spring. |

I am of the opinion, however, that if one wants to plant but a hun-
dred or two chestnuts that he will have no cause to regret it if he
prepares his bed in the autumn, makes a shallow furrow, places his
chestnuts in it, covering them loosely with leaves an inch deep and
then gives them a covering of half an inch of loose, rich soil. Mak-
ing allowances for failures from animals, ete., I have about eighty
per cent. of the nuts so planted to grow. Never allow a seed chest-
nut to become dry.

or
two

TWO WEEDS.

We seldom recognize a plant as a weed until it has become so
common as to threaten some industry. In other words, it has al-
ready become a common nuisance before any war is commenced
against it.

It may seem like a contradiction in terms, but it may fairly be
stated that the proper time to fight a weed is before it becomes a
weed.

Such a chance occurs now. From our Southern border a plant has
invaded the State. Originally it came from Europe. It is exceedingly
common in portions of Virginia, especially in the Shenandoah valley,
and is there known as blue thistle, or occasionally is expressively
named blue devils. To botanists it is known as Echium vulgare. The
illustration accompanying is taken from life, and is a very satisfac-
tory representation of the plant.

The blue thistle shows a marked preference for soils associated
with limestone rocks, and of such soils it is not unlikely to take
complete possession, unless they are frequently under cultivation.

It is true that up to this time it has not become a serious nuisance
in this State. It is equally true that it will probably become such
unless its increase is promptly prevented. Thus far it does not ap-
pear to have advanced more than seventy-five miles north of ou
southern border, and possibly its further advance will be slow, be-
cause it must adapt itself to the more rigorous conditions of a
Northern climate. Under any view of the case, now is the time to
extirpate the plant, before each of the thousands of seeds becomes
the parent of another thousand.

The plant is biennial; that is, its principal function during the
first season is to produce a strong root, well stored with nourishing

matter. From this root a vigorous flowering and fruiting stem will
be developed during the second summer.

The remedies are, frequent plowing and thick seeding, if the plant
has already obtained a considerable hold on the farm. Or if it is Just
making an appearance, it may be headed off early in the second
season by cutting the stem from the roots by a spud or pick-axe in-
serted just below the surface of the ground. It would doubtless also
be possible to destroy it by repeated cutting or pulling, if these were
commenced before the plant blossomed.

BLUE THISTLE.
Echium Vulgare.

53

The blue thistle may be briefly described thus: Herb, one to two
feet high, one or more stalks from same root; rough, bristly-hairy;
leaves narrowly lance-shaped, without footstalks; flowers, blue at
first, then more or less pink, funnel-shaped, with a somewhat irreg-
ular, lobed margin, from half to three-quarters of an inch long, some-
what crowded on branches which are often coiled at the tip; four
small roughened seeds in the bottom of the flower; blooms from June
to September, or even later.

The second weed to which attention is called is popularly known
in Pennsylvania as yellow daisy, brown betty, wild sun-flower.
Botanically it is called Rudbeckia hirta. This plant is said to have
been brought from the Mississippi valley to the East in clover
seed. It also grows naturally in Western New York, and hence
may be said to prefer a climate somewhat cooler than that of
this State. Its increase here has been so slow and its advance so in-
sidious that our farmers apparently have failed to recognize its dan-
gerous character. But it is each year becoming better adapted to
our conditions of soil and climate, and as it matures a large number
of seeds, it is merely a question of time before its presence will be
severely felt.

Of all the weeds which of recent years have invaded our State, this
is the one for whose continued existence there is the least excuse.
It is so conspicuous that it compels notice, and its multiplication has
been thus far so slow that there can be no reason for allowing it to
become a source of trouble. Yet its real character and power for
harm are evident when it is noted that in the states north and east of
us it is so abundant, just before the season of hay making, that it
literally colors whole fields of grass yellow.

I do not remember to have seen a field of grass in this State from
which it could not have been readily removed by pulling or digging.
Its eradication seems to be a question of now or never. I make this
statement in view of the fact that it continues to increase, and that
it has already become a nuisance in Ohio and New York.

It may be described thus: Biennial herb, one to two and a-half feet
high, rough-hairy, leaves narrowly oblong, without footstalks. lower
ones more or less distinctly three-ribbed; flowers from an inch and
a-half to four inches across, yellow, with a dark brown, convex or
conical centre. (Like a small sun-flower and having its circumference
composed of about fourteen yellow leaves.) If cut too early in the
season it is likely to grow again and still produce a crop of flowers
and seeds. It is becoming very popular with flower gatherers, who
should by all means be encouraged to pull it. It blooms frem June
to August.

54

LOSSES BY FIRES IN PENNSYLVANIA IN THE YEAR
1896, SO FAR AS HEARD FROM.

By the burning of the Capitol building on February 2d, the mass
of material which we had collected, at no little expense and labor,
bearing upon forest fires, as well as upon the quantity and kinds of
timber cut during the year 1896, were destroyed. But a few hours
before the fire Mr. Conklin and I had completed our estimates upon
data at hand. These lay on my table and were rescued. I make the
following very brief statement:

Number of acres burned over in 1896,............... 178,982
Quantity of timber burned, feet board measure,.... 121,752,322
Quantity of manufactured lumber burned, feet board

MIGASULE.. vac) eslaee ok a ae ee eee tee eure 7,391,080
MOrds GL bark DUM, vis 95.55 «how ele! sia seed wm ne ete a 30,764
‘OOst Of SUppressinS [OTest TCS 2.5 <24searesn she owt $21,269 00
Total money value of actual property burned,...... $557,056 00

I desire to add that these figures are clearly below the actual facts;
because: First—There was on the part of those who answered our
inquiries a very remarkable absence of anything which looked like
exaggeration. Second—Many of those furnishing information made
no estimate of the value of the time spent by themselves and their
neighbors in extinguishing fires. hird—In many instances there was
no estimate of the money lost by burning of young timber. Fourth—
Because from many regions in which it is known there were serious
fires we were unable to obtain any replies to our inquiries. This is
the more a matter of regret because the information sought was
wholly in the interest of the sufferers.

In the above estimate we have not included the destruction of
leaf mould and actual soil. These, as a matter of fact, exceed in value
the timber destroyed, because its restoration is exceedingly slow, and
without it reproduction of valuable timber often becomes very slow
and in some instances impossible.

The state forests of New York, under fire warden protection, had
burned over in 1895 (a much drier season than 1896) one acre out of
8474, whereas Pennsylyania in 1896, without fire wardens, had in its
woodland areas one acre out of 51 burned over.

The second annual report of the Commissioners of Fisheries, Game

55

and Forests (1896) for New York (page 67) is very explicit, and de-
clares that “ten years’ experience in the matter has demonstrated
that the present law relating to the protection of our woodlands from
fire is a practical one. We have reason to believe that the wide-
spread and disastrous fires which threatened the existence of our for-
ests at one time will not recur. We expect that small burnings on
private lands will continue to occur, and so there remains the diffi-
cult task of regulating the use of fire by land owners on their own
property. In this work we are assisted by public sentiment in the
forest towns, due to the law which provides that each town must pay
half the expense of fighting and extinguishing woodland fires. There
has, accordingly, arisen in each town a sort of censorship on the part
of the citizens and taxpayers which acts as a deterrent in the care-
less use of fire by the thoughtless and ignorant members of the com-
munity.”

It may help to the comprehension of this State’s actual loss by
fire if I were to add that the area burned over in 1896 was equal
to a strip of land one mile wide and 280 miles long, and that it would
require a wagon train of 112 miles in length to haul the bark so de-
stroyed. If the bark were ranked up four feet wide and four feet
high it would form a line almost 47 miles long.

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