The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1884-11-05
Forestry.

The legislature of 1882 authorized the
governor to appoint forestry COM
mission. In his retiring message Gov
ernor Barstow says he appointed Red
field Proctor, Frederick Billings and
Edward j. Phelps as commissioners
who accepted the appointment, and
their report will be laid before the leg
islature. A joint special committee on
forestry was created by the present legis-
lature, to which has been referred the
report of the commission. Her forests
are a matter of vital consequence to
Vermont. Interest in the subject does
not attach exclusively to her existing
forests. There is immediate, active in
terest in these. Forest products year
by year are advancing in value. For
fuel, manufactures, railways, furniture,
building and the numberless uses to
which wood is applicable, the demand
as steadily increases as the population
Increases, as the mechanic arts and
sciences advance, as the wants of man
are multiplied by a growing civilization.
Timber farming may yet become one of
the most lucrative industries of Yer
mont. Her mountain slopes and hill
sides are yet covered, over very con-
siderable portion of the state, with fine
forests. The impending danger is the
indiscriminate slaughter of these for
ests; the safeguard is wise and Judi
cious husbandry of them. We believe
the farmers have to some extent walked
up to a full realization of the value and
importance of their wood lands. A
noble growth of rock maple monarchs
is now less seldom sacrificed and con-
verted into ignoble cord-wood." A
forest of sugar naples should be as
zealously guarded from the axe in Yer
mont as an orange grove in Florida.
So in other ways the farmer has learned
to prize and protect his timber lands.
The great danger is from the itinerant
lumberman who sets up his steam mill
near some fine wooded section and pur-
sues his depredations till he has rem
dered the region within "paying :"
radius miniature Sahara and then
HES him to new scenes of lawless
and mercenary wastefulness from
the lumber company that buys large
tracts of land and sweeps them as
the locust scourged Egypt. Matured
timber, saplings, brush and briers
are merged in a general destruc-
ton. The fire, and after the fire the
mountain flood, contributes to the ruin
and converts what was once a fine
wooded region, grateful to the eye and
blessing to mankind, into bleak,
unsightly and profitless waste. This
brutal and mercenary course has been
pursued, and is being followed to-day,
in many portions of Vermont and par
ticularly in the northern and northeast
ern sections. On the other hand there
are lumbermen owning valuable timber
land who manage them with view to
preserving their resources and making
them as permanent source of income
as the hay and grain fields and orchards
of the farmer. The matured timber is
cut and the saplings are protected and
left to expand in the spaces vacated by
their sires. We have in mind lumber
man in this county who owns large
area of spruce and hard wood lands.
He pursues this wise policy in husband
ing his forest resources and the growth
of the timber is sufficient to keep his
mills running. The annual product is
about million feet. In this way the
rugged and rocky mountain slopes, use.
less and worthless for other purposes
become permanent andlucrative sources
of income while maintaining their forest
robes to beautify the landscape, check
the sweep of the winds, keep the foun-
tains of the streams flowing and shed
benefcence and healthfulness over the
state. What helegislature can lawfully