Daily camera., 1898-03-04
OAK is GETTING SCARCE
The Visible Supply Is Rapidly
Disappearing.
Increased Consumption During the
Hard Times Period on Ac-
count of It's Being
Cheap Wood.

No one who is at all familiar with
existing conditions in the lumber trade
can fail to note that there is already
considerable complaint of the dearth
of desirable oak. Both in quartered and
plain stock fairly good lots of dry oak
are notably scarce. The leading job
bers have had their buyers out for
months picking up anything good they
could find, and the result is that very
large proportion of the oak on sticks
has already passed into second hands
and is he'd by the present owners for.
distribution to consumers. Mill men
in the south are cutting it all the time,
but they do not have to wait until it
is dry, or even partly dry, before sell
ing. If they choose to do so, they can
usually negotiate for it in advance OF
the saving, and on terms that few
years ago would have been regarded
as extremely liberal. Oak is, perhaps,
the most readily salable of any saw
mill product, which fact indicates that
it is now, and is believed likely to be
hereafter, relatively scarce article.
While there is no occasion for alarm
as to the present adequacy of the oak
supply. it is question if the time has
rot come when serious consideration
should be given to the possibility, not
to say probability, that in the not dis
scarce woods. Considering the wide
distribution Of oak. this may strike
many lumber men as a remote con
tingency, but that it is not an impos-
sib,e result, CT SO distant in point of
time as to be removed from present
consideration, is suggested at least by
the existing conditions of demand and
supply. Oak has been called for stead
i,y during most of the hard time period.
The consumption has been large, and
has even increased, while that of
other woods has fallen below the nor
NAL quantity. This shows an increas-
ing popularity and growing require
rnent which, it is obvious, must be met
from the misunderstanding supply.
The growth of oak is too slow to count
much in adding to our stock. Practi
cally we are restricted for supplies to
the wood already grown and ready for
the saw. That there is of this no in
exhaustible stock is readily proved by
the difficulty, which has increased rap
idly within the last five or ten years, of
buying the standing timber in punches
large enough to make them the basis
of a numbering operation. If oak can
not be bought in quantities now, there
is no reason to suppose that it is ever
going to be any more plentiful. If it
cannot be found now, it never can be,
and within a comparatively short time
the lumber trade and the users of oak
must face the fact that it does not ex-
ist in sufficient quantity to warrant the
liberal and even wasteful use that is
now made of it.
1t is the conviction OF those who have
given the closest study to oak that its
present market value is based upon an
incorrect idea of what is left, and that
we shall wake up some morning to find
that we have sold almost for a song
the most valuable of our timber pos
sessions. Oak, except in the finest
grades of quartered stock, is still
cheap wood. Is it not too cheap for a
variety that is in universal demand and
in only limited supply ?-St. Louis Lum-
herman.