Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1875-06-11


Correspondence Of the New York worldl
read in Tho World of the 25lh an ex-
cellent editorial sn 1.-THE Preservation of
Our Forests" Ii is subject in which / am
greatly interested, and hope you will re-
fer TO ii not once but oflen, and press ii up
on the public until something practical and
definite is done in the matter. l have tried
for several years past in a feeble way TO
bring it to the attention of our public men,
and nj the last session determined effort
was made to get it before Congress and OBJ
tain legislation. The President sent rec
ommendation TO the Senate, and bill was
drafted, but nothing came of it. The wan
ton destruction of forests aud the useless
killing of buffalo and wild birds are alike
painful, and each is productive of many
evils. The loss of crops in tue West last
year by grasshoppers was, believe in
great measure due to the slaughter Of birds
in past years. Thousands and thousands
of prairie hens, sage hens, snipe and many
other kinds Of birds are every season shot
for no other purpose than the sport of kill
ing them. So, too, of the buffalo. Last
fall, when the people living in the Republi-
can Valley had their crops destroyed, they
found themselves in the natural range of
the buffalo without meat. little care in
saving them and they could have had buff
Galo in plenty. Some Of the very men who
were hungry for meat had killed buffalo
for their hides. ! have seen a thousand
pounds of good meat wasted to obtain a
hide worth dollar. II is shame, and a
summary stop should be put TO such de-
struciiyeness and waste OF good things.
The present and ever-iucrcssing want of
timber demands a general awakening on
the subject of forest-saving. There is pow
left unit ouched in the whole of the United
States but one really fine belt of timber,
that growing on about one nalf of Wash
inglon Territory and one third of Oregon.
1t is still a vast scope of land covered by
magnificent yellow fir, many of the trees
being 800 feet high. But when the North
ern Pacific railroad is built ii will open up
this belt and it will soon be destroyed.
Then the last of the great American forests
will have disappeared. Already exporta-
tons from it 10 China, Japan, and Hawaii
have begun, and it cannot last over ten,
twenty, or at most thirty years. 1t will be
for the next half decade our source Of sup
ply of ship building timber, and then
where shall we 60 for our ship-timber?
California has perhaps 5OO,O 900 acres OF
fine forest, one-third of which was cut
away in the last two years; hut that Slate,
aware of the future necessity, has wisely
commenced the culture of Australian and
Eucalyptus trees, both of which grow rap
idly and to immense size.
The great Wisconsin forests are in proc
ess of rapid destruction. No less than L.
100000, 600 feet of lumber were cut in a sim
gle year. Tens Of thousands of logs are
annually RATED down the Mississippi 10
towns in Iowa, where they are cut into
boards. One firm young & Coz have at
Clinton, Ia, 200 saws running, and three
fourths OF the lumber they cut goes 10 Kan
sas and Nebraska. In a single year 1885,
10000 feet of Wisconsin logs were cut in
Iowa. At the present rate of telling, in
Ten or at most twenty years from now, not
only The Wisconsin but Michigan and Min
nesota forests will be swept away. Fifty
thousand acres OF Wisconsin timber are
cut annually TO supply the Kansas and Ne
braska market alone.
New York has lost her maple, walnut
and hickory forests, and now has nothing
left worthy of the name of big woods ex-
cept her Adirondacks. In Pennsylvania
The destruction has been still more wan
ton. The land spectators have bought up
every Bit of The Allegheny fine forests and
in their haste TO make money have glutted
the market with lumber OF all kinds.
What these vandals spared the fires are
now taking.
A few people only are aware Of the vast
inroads made on our tree-grOwing regions.
Take the matter of railroad ties alone, and
the tens of thousands OF miles yet to he
built make the question of ties one Of vital
importance. The II, OOO miles of railroad
in the United States has required in build
ing the use of 1S4,GO0,O00 ties, and these
have 10 be replaced by new ties every sew
en- years. Ties, as every one knows, are
made from young timber, and the cutting
of them strikes at the very source of our
timber supply.
Incredible as It may seem, ii is true that
forest lands arc still cleared for the pur-
pose of being brought under cultivation.
From 1860 to 1870 not less than twelve mil
lion acres of forest were cut, the timber
logged or burned on the ground and The
land farnIed. The actual decrease of forest
by logging and burning is still over a mil
lion acres per year.
The demand for lumber in the whole
United States increases at tho rate OF about
25 per cent per annum, and the supply has
in The last year increased 30 per cent, show
ing that lumber producers, in their haste
10 destroy the forests, are Overstocking the
market. While the increase of forests from
planting is less than one million acres, The
decrease from all causes is over eight mil
lion acres annually. As an example, 1t is
reported Chicago in 1871 received $500, 600
feet of lumber, and 10, 600 acres were strip
ped of timber to supply that great city with
fuel alone.
have already referred to the railroads
and the important part they play in the de-
struction of timber, but the fences Of the
United STATES are really the great consum
ers of our trees. This drain is almost be-
yond human computation or belief, and in
every Stale in the East our farmers are be-
coming alarmed as TO what they shall dc
for fence timber in the next fifteen OF TWEEN.
ty years. Each ono is yearly economizinl
more and more his little store of timber
but still be secs 1t melting away and nc
new forests at hand TO replace it. II is an
astonishing fact that the fences of the Unit
cd States have cost more than the land, and
they are to-day the most valuable class Of
property in the country except railroads
and real estate in The cities. Our fences are
now valued at g. 800, OO0, 200, aud to keeE
in repair costs sos, OOO,O 900 annually. In II