Arizona republican., 1908-11-12
SCIENTIFIC STUDY
 0F TIMBER SAVING
It Will Involve Methods of Arrestine Decay.

The future development of the lum- Der industry in this country lies in the direction of closer utilization of forest products. Both foresters and practical lumbermen now agree on this point.
 Just what can be done in this field is well illustrated in the operations at the mill of the Great Southern Lumber company, which has just re- opened its plant at Bogalusa, La, in response to the increased demand for lumber after the recent slump in business. This is perhaps the largest sawmill in the United States. if not in the world, and is capable of turning out the enormous amount of 600.000 feet of sawed lumber board measure per day. A reader can get fair idea of this quantity of lum- Der when he is told that its output is enough to build a little town of forty houses, along with a good sized church and school house every day
 This company was quick to grasp the significance of the rapid deple- tiOn ftimber resources. Last year it began a cooperative investigation in wood utilization with the United States forest service and arrange ments have just been completed for a renewal of the experiments. The work will be along practical lines and will be aimed to secure a closer utilization of the products of the southern lumber mills and at the same time produce a margin of profit in excess of that obtained by the methods which are now practiced.
 The field for work along this line is broad. It is well known that the superior grades of lumber are ob- tained from old mature trees, pro vided thay are not weakened by de- cay or other influences. In other words, a thousand feet board measure of lumber, sawed from a tree two feet in diameter, costs less and is worth more than a thousand feet sawed from a tree only eight inches in diameter. Moreover, timber cut from young trees usually contains a large amoutn of sapwood If ties, poles, etc, are cut from such ma terial, they will decay far more rap idly than if cut from heartwOod. It is not good business |policy, however, in great many cases, to saw the Naost valuable timber into commodi- ties which are relatively low in cost, such as ties and poles. It is the in tention therefore, of the company to find out just what size and classes of timber can be best utilized for the cheaper commodities when given a preservtaive treatment.
 To this end careful study will be made to ascertain the amount and value of the products sawed from trees of different sizes and just how each can be best utilized so as to se- cure greatest economy and profit For example, can tree eight inches in diameter be best utilized for ties or for flooring. and how will the profits compare if treated with those to suppose that the profits derived from the sale of treated timber will exceed those from untreated timber
 Moreover. the greater use of chemi- cally preserved wood will undoubt- edly result in that wood giving a greater life in esrvice. Hence, the amoutn of timber cut annually in the United States, simply to replace that which has decayed, will be materially decreased, and a further conservation of forest resources will result. Re cent estimates by the forest service place this reduction at 10 per cent of the total timber cut The practical benefits of these experiments and of the investigations for the utilization of sawmiu waste are at once ap- parent