The Montgomery advertiser., 1908-12-13

The fish which live in forest waters furnish each year y21,000,000 worth of food. and not. less than half as much Is furnished by the game which could not exist without the forest.
 What We Have.
 Our forests now cover $50. 100000 acres or about one-fourth of the United States. The original forests covered not less than 1000, 900 acres. or nearly one-haf.
 Forests publicly owned cover one- fourth of the total forest area, and contain one-fifth of all timber stand ing. Forests privately owned cover three-f0urths Of the area and contain four-flfths of the standing timber. The sim6 sn,,h CT IT, priystely owned is not only is generally more valuable.
 Forestry Is now practfced on 70 per cent of the forests publicly owned and privately owned. or on only IS per cent of the total forest area.
 What Is Produced.
 The yearly growth of wood in our twelve cubic feet per acre. This gives a total yearly growth of less than 1000, ,0oo. 900 cubic feet.
 What ia Used.
 We take yearly. including waste in logging and in manufacture, a, ,000, ,000,- 900 cubic feet of wood from our for ests.
 We use each year 100,000.000 cords of firewood. 10000, ,oeo.0o feet of lumber, fence rails. l1s. .oOo. 600 hewn ties. i,5o0,- 100000 slaves, over 133, 1000, 900 sets of heading, nearly 500000,000 barrel hoops 165, ,000,0oe cubic feet of round mine timbers. and l.25o.oeo cords of wood for distillation.
 ; What Is Wasted.
 Since 1870. forest fires have each year destroyed an average of fifty lives less than 50, ,Ooo, GOO acres of forest is burned over~yearly.
 One-fourth of the standing timber is left or otherwise lost in logging. The ing has destroyed one-ffth of the for ests worked. The loss in the mill 10 from onsthiTd E tTo.thirds 0ss ,s of , the product, through seasoning and fitting for use, Is from one-seventh to one
 Only s2o feet of lumber are used, for each 1000 feet which stood in the forest.
 Where We stand.
 We take from our forests each year, not counting the loss by fire, three and
 hsf ssr es tssir st yearly gT0wsh than 16 per cent iu the last seven years. But the, average price of all kinds of lumber at the mill has risen 4s per cent. and the rise will con-
 We invite by overtaxation the mis- use of our forests. We destroy by fire enough standing timber in one year to, last last the nation for three farms from wind and to make stripped pr treeless lands productive, an area larger than that of Pennsylvania, Ohio far, lands successfully planted to trees make total area smaller than Rhode Island. And year by year. by careless cutting and oy fire we lower the ca- pacity or existing forests to produce 1 them.
 The condition of the world supply of timber makes us already dependent up- our country one and a half times as much timber as we bring in. Except l for finishing woods, relatively lnsig- nlncant in quantity, we must grow our own supply, or go without. Where We Might stand By reasonable thrift we can produce constant timber supply beyond our present need and with it conserve the usefulness of cur streams for irriga- ton. water supply, navigation and
 Under right management. our for ests will yield over four times as much as now. We can reduce waste in the wo5ds and in the min at least Ct'C 7eHhA u " Atn EtCSO't GS WSAl As Au- ture proGl. We can perpetuate the naval stores industry. Preservative treatment will reduce by one-ffth the quantity of timber used in the water or in the ground We can practically stop forest fires at a total yearly cost of one-fifth the value of the standing timber burned each year, not count ing young growth. We shall suffer for timber to meet our needs until our forests have had time to STOW again. But if we. act