Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1922-10-20
SAVING FORESTS
MANY Methods Of Conservation NOW
Being Used.
LAMlNATED WOOD IS NOW POPULAR
Timber Supply Is Decreasing and 1t
ls Necessary That Some Steps to
Conserve Be Taken-Problem a
Grave One In South Carolina.

Washington, u. IN no great
American industry, not even the meat
packing industry, in which by ccm-
mon Sepute everything is utilized but
thefhog's squeal, is conservation today
receiving greater attention than in the
lumber industry. The lumber produc-
e., once OF all our industrial giants the
greatest and most notorious wastrel,
has begun to be propident and canny.,
The industry has been forced to it. Its
alternatives is to change. methods or
prepare for the end of greatness And
what is now being done. 10 change
methods, constitutes one of the most
interesting stories in modern industrial
science
The fact is that America is nearing
the end OF her timber resources. Even
ten years ago the prediction that the
end was nigh was secuted as the out
cry OF the professional alarmist But
expanding population, the enormous
demand of the war for lumber, the
ceaseless forest fires, oil have done
their work. America is faced with
the unpleasant fact that her once
seemingly inexhaustible forests, which
stretched ecross 5000 miles with only
q break for the Great Plains, are near
ing. exhaustion.
Pinch Being Felt.
Already the pinch is being felt es-
pecialiy in the East. The growing
prices tell part of the story The con-
sumption of lumber has dropped from
an, average per capita use of 500 board
feet in 1906 to BIG board feet in 1920
drop of 81 per cent in fourteen years.
Cddsry this out to the end, and the con-
sumption of lumber would case alto
gethcr about the year 1910. The rem
nants of the virgin stands Of pine in
the Southern states will be cut out in
another ten years. That will leave the
Pacific northwest as the sole remain
ing chief source of lumber, and lumber
prices in the East will be based OH
Oregon and Washington, prices plus
the freight rate across the continent,
rate, that is n greater sum per 1000
board feet than fasteners had to pay
for lumber itself. including the haul
age charge, few years ago.
The government was first to realize
the impending doom of the American
forests, and to combat it established
protect and maintain the timbered
areas of the public domain set aside
in perpetuity as national forests. Ger
tain states followed the governments
example by establishing state forest
Services. A little over ten years ago
the forest service established at Mad
ison, Wisconsin, the Forests Products
laboratory to study the problems of
the industry scientifically devoting
special attention to the conservation
of wood after it was cut. The indus
try at that time may have looked
askance at this innovation as being an
. reaus. Be that as it may, when the
Laboratory celebrated it's tenth ami
versary recently, lumbermen travelled
thousands. of miles to be there and as
sist with their presence. The Labora-
tory has already saved millions to the
industry and it has only just begun to
show what it can do.
Finally the lumber industry itself
took up the campaign of conservation
Through its own organization, the Ma
tional Lumber Manufacturers associ-
alton, it is cooperating with the vari-
Gus official bodies as well as pursuing
its own lines of research.
A Two-Fold Problem.
There is room here only to outline a
few Of the methods whereby the tim
ber supply of the United States is to
be saved. The problem is two-fold
although both halves are interknit-
the conservation in forests themselves,
and, secondly, conservation in the mills
and in the use Of lumber
In the woods the greatest problem is
fire. Even with today's diminished
per capita use of lumber, we are cut
ting down trees four times as fast as
nature can grow new wood; but in
spite Of all the systems OF protection.
the forest fire continues to be even
more destructive than the woodman's
AK. The solution OF the fire problems
seems to be 4 more elaborate system
OF fire protection and greater coopera-
tion with state and national fire pro-
lection service on the part OF private
owners of timber lands.
OF the more than $4,000 forest fires
anpually, lightning starts about one
fifth of them and human carelessness
the rest. The tobacco smoker is the
chief offender \ strong effort is be-
ing made to induce tobacco manufac-
turers to print fire warnings on all
packages of cigars cigarettes and pipe
tobacco.
The chief damage wrought by forest
fires is not in the virgin timber, but i'll
the cut-over lands in which the young
trees have not yet reached merchant
able size. 1t is burning the wealth of
the fJturC Three TODIf bS of all ciIt-