The daily morning journal and courier., 1907-02-04
FORESTER HAWES REVIEW
GIVEN BEFORE MEETING OF CONN FORESTRY ASSOCIATION

Connecticut Leads New England States in Matter of Systematic Forestry Not Timber, but Pole and Tie Pro- ducIng state-Heavy Taxation Dis- eOuragement-system of Fire Ward ems of Great Value to state-Im- provements Suggested.
 "In the fourth annual report of the Society for the Protection of the New Hampshire Forests occurs this state ment:
 "Connecticut has led not only Mas sachusetts and Rhode Island in su- curing the services of a technically trained state forester, but also entire New England in her admirable fire law Connecticut was the first New England state to establish state for est reserve"
 NOT A TIMBER PRODUCING
 STATE.
  quite different from that of New Hampshire and other real timber pro ducing states. Recent statistics show that Connecticut and Rhode Island together cut less lumber than the prairie state of Iowa, which is a sad confession, considering the once valu- able forests in these states and the originally almost treeless condition of some of these western states AL though New England furnished six hundred million feet of box boards last year, only two per cent. of this was cut in Connecticut, which was the same as Rhode Island produced, while forty-eight per cent. was cut in Mas sachusetts. Railroad ties and poles are the principle products of our for ests which is the consequence of the great predominance of chestnut. Of ties alone probably 100000 are cut annually in Connecticut, yet this is only an average of one tie per acre per annum for the agricultural land It is perfectly evident that the agricultural part of the state. is yielding very much less than it should One travelling through the state cannot fail to be impressed with. the thousands of acres covered with birch, red cedar and other worthless brush.
 The object of forestry is of course to turn this non-p productive area into valuable forests and to increase the growing capacity of already existing forests. This must be the aim of the state forest policy.
 The first step that was taken to- ward this was the appointment by the Agricultural Experiment station of a trained forester in 1901. As one of the principle lines of work in the state must be necessarily the planting of waste lands, a considerable tract of sand plain land was purchased by the Experiment Station in Windsor and numerous experiments in forest plant ing have been tried there. The five years which have elapsed since the first planting show that the pine, are far the best adapted to this sandy soil, white pine, Scotch pine and red or Norway pine doing equally we'll. The trees of these plantations are now growing an average of one foot a year in height.
 STATIONS OFFER ASSISTANCE
 TO LAND OWNERS.
 Along with this experimental plant ing work an offer was made by the Experiment Station to give expert ad- vice to farmers and all forest owners to assist them in a better manage ment of their lands While the far mers themselves have been naturally conservative in taking up forestry, the owners of large estates have quite generally availed themselves of this offer. Water companies have also seen the advantage of the work and the improvement undertaken by the Middletown water board is already near completion. During three years 105,267 trees were planted by this board while the plan calls for only ninety-six thousand more. Forty eight acres are completely planted, and fifty-nine partly planted, making 1O7 out of the 168 called for in the plan. DEMAND FOR ASSISTANCE NOT
 GREAT ENOUGH.
 Since the only expense to land own CTS for expert assistance was that of travelling expenses and maintenance of the forester while examining the land, 1t seemed that the demand for such assistance was much less than it should be, although the offer was wide- ly advertised. One of the tracts plant ed by the station in Windsor was in two successive years burned over.
 DAMAGE BY FOREST FIRES.
 Investigation showed that large woodland fires covering hundreds of acres annually were frequent in the spring. These were usually allowed to burn unhampered until they ap- proached some valuable woodot or set of buildings. One fire on Hedge Hog Mountain in Union destroyed three years ago several thousand dollars worth of timber and altogether 1t was evident that the annual damage in the state through such fires was in excess of one hundred thousand dollars. As there is no possibility of insuring standing timber this represents a total loss to the people of the state.
 Considering the fact that forest land is taxed heavier than any other form of property, it seems preposterous that owners of such property should have been entirely without protection from fire from the community. Strange as it may seem, the people accustomed to this sort of exaction from one genera ton to another had never thought of demanding any protection in return. HEAVY vYTAXATIONAND FREQUENT