Little Falls weekly transcript. (Little Falls, Morrison Co., Minn.) 1894-19??, 1898-05-10
Low Water In the Northern
Streams.


common thing every spring for lum-
ber,nen 10 talk about the probability
.of drives being hnngup. There prob
ably has not been spring in the last
thirty years during which there has
not been a little scare over the get
ting down of the winters cut III
logs, but enough logs usually do
come down to keep the mills going.
1t can be safely said. however, that
this spring the low water IN all
northern log driving streams Is so
marked that that there ia in reality
danger of a great many million feet
of logs b.ing hung up until next
year.
The first week In May has nearly
passed, and there are many idle saw
mills in Minnesota and Wisconsin
and along the Mississippi river. The
talk OF a log scarcity during the saw
ing season of 1891 is no joke. No
matter how many times in the past
it has been predicted in the early
spring that the logs would he hung
up, and they were not, this year the
conditions at the present writing
are such that it will take a vast
amount of water to bring down the
farthesr drives. Not only one
stream ia effected. but practically all
driving waters. The eleven saw
mills at Minneapolis are idle, and are
likely to remain SO for some time.
1t will take in the neighborhoodIof a
two-foot raise il the Mississippi
river at this point to bring the logs
to the mills. TO be sure this. height
will probably be attained ere long.
but every days delay means a short
eniEg Of the saving season that
much. The logs that are being
rallied into Brainerd and other points
ON the upper Mississippi will go down
to the mills the coming summer, but
there is u prospect OF a number
of the drives on the small
tributary streams being hung up un-
til 1899.
Up in the Cloquet district the fall
of snow last winter was very light,
and when it disappeared this spring
it did not make enough water to
raise the st. Louis river to it's nor
NAL height. Two Of the ClOquet mills
began saving, but they have been
obliged to shut down, having sawed
all OF the logs they had left over at
the mills.
No logs are coming down the st.
CrOix as yet owing to thelow water,
and there is a lively scramble for the
old logs at Saltwater.
Reports from the Chippewa are of
similar teaOr. 1t will take very
heavy rains to bring down the new
logs on the Chippewa and its. tribu-
taries, and it will be but a short
time before the Chippewa Falls and
Eau Claire mills have exhausted
their supply CT left over logs. If the
new logs do not arrive by that time
saving will have to be suspended.
A year ago this time in some Sec
lions of the northwest saving was
suspended on account Of high water
notably at Minneapolis, but low
water is everywhere the rule this
year. When it ia considered that the
total amount Of logs put in last
winter on northern driving streams
was mnch smaller than usual, it is
apparent that the cut OF white pine
mills for 1898 will not be a record
breaker. In hhe Duluth district, for
instance, well posted lumbermen say
that there are not more than 26O, 900,
600 feet OF logs that can be depended
upon providing all the drives come
down, which now seems not likley to
be:the case. A light log supply and q
light lumber cut seems to be the In
evitable future for the saving season
of 1898.