The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1908-09-06
GROWING A FOREST ANEW
MILLIONS OF YOUNG TREES FOR
waste ADIRONDACK LAND.

waste ADIRONDACK LAND.
Tie state Raising White Pines and Other
E~yergreens From Seed ut the Saranac
Nurscry-One Million Young Trees
set out Last Spring at One Station
When you SEQ 10. 1000 white pines grow.
ing in a space twelve feet by four you have
Green forests OF this country may yet be
rorewed. You arc still moro hopeful
when YOU learn that the State Of New
York is able to furnish young pines al
g; - a thousand without losing money
and that the percentage Of loss from the
scod to the we'll grown tree Is very small.
4, is statistics Of this kind that one
gathers at tho State Forestry Depart.
ment.'s nursery lying within sight Of the
railway station called sG-aaeo Inn, cbout
two miles from Saranac Lake. AT this
nursery ard ct others eer by under tho
care of the same forestry station over
green's are grown by the million upon the
him sandy soil Of the Adirondccks on
richad for the seedlings by tho application
Of swamp muck, barnyerd manure and
wood ashes.
Here grow white pire. red pine, Scotch
pine, bull pine from the Black Hills OF
Dakota. Norway spruce. native spruce.
tsmarack, all in large quantities. end a
few others in experimental numbers. A
specialist, trained at tho Cornell school
Of forestry. has general charge Of the
work on tho ground. end ct, the busiest
season Of the year there c-e about 125
persons. employed at the station and in
its work far or nea-.
During the first three weeks OF Septem-
bar the evergreen seed crop is harvested.
The cones are gathered by men who
climb the trees for the purpose. Most
of the cones come from the Lake Cham
plain region. and the native Adirondack
cones are little used because conditions
in the region arc not highly favorable
to the development Of evergreen fruit.
The cones fetch from rs cents to 81 a
bushel. according to quality and season.
II gathered too early the seeis are apt
10 be immature; il gathered too late the
cones may have opened up n she1 some
Of their seeds. Last year almost exactly
1900 bushels Of cones yielded nearly l.450
pounds Of seed, but a pound to the bushel
Is n DlRn X AIM tiioA 80 yS@aS
when it requires nearly three bushels
Of cones TO yield a pound OF seed.
II the seeds are not too fat a pound will
Weld about 10, 200 seeds, SO that last years
crop must have been somewhere near
n.5oo.oO sesis. Foreign seeds are
bought at about SIPS a pound, mostly in
Scotland and Norway.
When the cones reach the station they
are placed in a house that has a roof
Int no sides and upon shelflike Slated
platforms just far enough one above
another to permit Of the comfortable
handling Of the crop. Here the cones
dry for about two weeks.
As they begin TO open they are taken
out a few at a time, subjected to heat
and regularly threshed with a fail such
as was used two generations 9 to thresh
wheat. Doubtless the thing could be
done c heaper with a special machine for
the purpose, were it not that the use OF
the fail enables the station to keep its
regular employees busy at a time whel
they would otherwise be idle.
When thpeshe1 out the seeds are passed.
through screens SO that their wings may
be taken of. The seeds are thea famed
with an ordinary agricultural fan run
by hand. Whea thus thoroughly cleansei
they are put up in tins so that they shall
be protected alike from moisture and
EVAPORATION anu blOicI III dn uhiiCatCi
room for the winter.
In the spring the seeds are sown broad
cast by hand in enriched, beds enclosed
In wooden frames. termination takes
place at somewhat irregular intervals,
often in two weeks, and the tiny see Hing
Chiefly because Of this latter fact the
beds are screened with wire the meshes
Of which are too small to admit any bird.
for birds take delight in eating the seeds
and incidentally they thus Destroy the
settings.
The four feet by twelve beds in which
the seeds are sown are to be the abiding
place of the seedlings for two years. At
the end Of the first year the screens are
removed and the seedlings are left open
10 the air and sky. Before the end Of
the second summer the ten thousand
seedlings crowded in these small beds
look like q dense glass plot. unless. in
deed, the bed has met with some form
of i'll luck.
Late frosts sometimes kill the young
seedlings the first year. and a prolonged
drought is likely to destroy a good many.
Artificial watering is found to be no very
efectual substitute for rain.
inches in height, are ready to be trans
planted. They now need more DON 30
as tr~ansplents they stand four inches
apart in the row and the rows are elk
inches apart. Two men VIII transplant
500 seedlings in an hour. or 1000 a day.
The loss from tr~ansplanting into the beds
lis extremely small. This year 1t wal
only one-half of l per cent.
1t is these trees that at three or four
years are again transplanted upon the
waste land owned by the State. and are
sold at 1878 a thousand. Similar trees
ara sold by n~urserymen in the middle
West at about $40 a thousand,
TIT State began the work OF stocking
waste land with such everRreens in 1902.
and has since planted nearly ~thirty-eight
hundred acres. Here again the oes Is
small. and local sentiment in the Adiron-
dacks is 30 friendly to the work that
nobody disturbs the little trees.
The work of transplanting into the
open is done between April I and May 20.
1t is sometimes said that ever9reens
transplanted in the fall will not live. but
this is untrue. In the dir ondack climate.
however, it is best that the newly trans
planted tree rave a long period OF growth
before il Is forced to endure its first win
t. under new conditions.
Trees thus transplanted to wild land
ne set Elk feet apart and / 200 to the aore.
Il is the theory OF the exrert f~oresterH
'hi' white Pine thus thickly got should
h0'a thirty-hvo years to make their
t"ir't. They should then be thinned.
in which process half the trees should be