The Fargo forum and daily republican. [volume] (Fargo, N.D.) 1894-1957, 1910-08-30
LEARNS HOW FORESTRY
FLOURISHES ON PRAIRIES
w. c. Palmer Of the A. c., Describes the Experimental
Farm and Forest Nursery Being Conducted by the
Canadians Of the Far Northwest.

w. c. Palmer, who has charge Of the
publicity work at the A. c., has re-
turned from Indian Head, Saskatche-
wan where he went to study the results
which the Canadian government has
obtained with their big experiment Of
forestry on the prairie.
q "The Canadians are very much alive
10 the value Of farming and have made
provision for encouraging it, and for
working out the best methods" said
Mr.. Palmer today. AT Indian Head
are located both the experiment farm
and the dominion forestry farm. The
sfirst was started in 1887 and the lat
ter in 1905.
"The conditions here are in one sense
severe in that the rainfall is but lie
inches year, the winters are quite
cold and the wind blows considerable
as is to be expected on the prairie.
On approaching the experimental farm
the first thing that attracts ones at
tention is what appears to be a woods
sAs che gets closer ii becomes appar
-eht that the farm is surrounded with
trees and that the outside rows are
lstunted from having to bear the brunt
of the wind, they also have a poor
rcolor, the next row is taller and each
succeeding row grows more vigorous
itilI inside the hedge the trees are
making very vigorous growth.
The first person I met was Angus
Mckay, the superintendent He has
had charge of the farm ever since it
was started and still oversees the work
personally, so that one will find him
about the barns or in the fields or gar
den, where ever the work is being done.
THE morning I reached the farm he
was on his way to the farm end of
the farm to see about cutting a little
piece Of wheat that was too green to
cut with the rest of the field. He in
vited me to seat in the buggy which
K gladly accepted AS we drove from
the barn 1t was through a covered
archway Of trees, trees lined both sides
of the roadway as far as we drove He
told me that they were troubled with
the wind drifting the soil so that one
~of the first things that they tried to do
was to grow trees. The farm had
been In wheat for FIVE year when they
bought it in 1887 and was in wheat
that year. In 'sS they prepared the
land for planting trees. In 'S9 they i'm
ported lot of trees from Ontario and
the states and planted them. The trees
did not do well and finally died. Then
In 81 they gathered seed Of ash and
boxelder or Manitoba maple and plant
ed them in nursery rows. In '92 and
'93 they were set out along the drive
ways and around the outside of the
farm. Along the drive ways one row
on each side of the road was planted
while along the outside of the farm
several rows so as to break the wind.
There are now thirteen miles of such
driveway on the farm and some of the
trees have grown so large that they
form closed arch over the road. The
farm is divided into fields of twenty to
100 acres and between each trees are
PLANTED.
1t was very evident that the crops
were better along the trees. Mr.. Mckay
.stated that the trees helped the crops
to distance of eighty for each foot
in height. So that twenty five foot
windbreak would help crops to a dis
lance of 1000 feet or little over twelve
rods. The windbreaks have also stop
ped the drifting of the soil. On the