St. Tammany farmer., 1922-10-21
ARE ALWAYS TO
BE 200 YEARS
BEHIND THE
TIMES?
This Will Surely Happen If
St. Tammany Goes for
!" Reforestation
nR(!AlExANDnR,s
IDEA is WRONGs
We Must Get Out of he
Forest Period Before
We Can Grow
(By A. E. Briggs)

(By A. E. Briggs)
With due respect for the judg-
ment of man who occupies a high
position in a state department, vet
it is impossible to- agree with Hon.
M. l.. Alexander, the State Conser-
vation Commissioner, who sought
Tuesday at the Covington courthouse
to convince our citizens and the Po-
lice Jury that there is no PROMISING
future before our parish besides that
OF reforestatlon for the maintenance
OF hunting preserve and trapper's
paradise.
Is it true, as he says, that it will
take 2O0 years more to settle UP the
State of Louisiana with farmers. and
& that the only feasible present plan
for the state and this parish is to
grow trees? If that is SO and if that
is the program we are facing i'm
mediate bankruptcy, because it will
take at least 20 years before we can
begin to realize appreciable returns
on a new forest. In the meantime
what will become of the fourishing
business which was founded on the
sudden increase in the lumber indus.
try and which is now fast waning and
soon be a thing of the past.
But Mr.. Alexander is mistaken in
his arguments. He says it has taken
200 years to get million acres into
cultivation in Louisiana, and there
fore it is reasonable to assume that
it will take 200 years more to bring
into cultivation the 9 millions of
acres OF more of our cut-over lands.
But that is not reasonable.
In less than SO years every one of
the Middle West States were settled
up, and in many of these states there
were virgin forests which presented
quite as difficult problems of clear
Ing as does our pineywoods. In
4'deed any old woodsman of pioneer
days in Iowa and Illinois. had tn ssle
with stumps and brush which cannot
ssibe equaled here excepting In cy-,
press clearing. There is more farm
land in every one of these states than
entire acreage Of Louisiana. Take
oklahoma for example In the 10
years between 1900 and 1910 nine
million acres of farms were brought
into high state of cultivation in the
State of Oklahoma. Evidently Mr..
alexander has not taken the pains
to acquaint himself with these facts.
Mr.. Alexander boasts that Louisi-
ana ranks first in the production of
1urs. But he overlooks the fact that
where coon skins, skunk hides and
possum pelts abound there is little
OF general prosperity. St. Tammany
parish is building it's hopes, if it has
any, on the relegation of the fur
trade to be merely memory of the
past. 1t takes a lot more acres of
land to provide living in the trap
ping business than in agriculture
Put all the possible revenues to-s
gether Of trapping, hunting, free
cattle range and forest, and it would
take hundred years of forestry and
its products to equal three years of
agricultural production of which
this parish is capable. There is just
that much difference between the
poverty of timbered region and the
prosperity which is common to agr'-
cultural countries.
In the land Biennial Report Of the
Department it is urged that we "re-
forest all cut-over timber lands that
are not and cannot be utilized for
agriculture within the next thirty
years or more" If that is the test,
then there is no land in st. Tammany.
parish which is available for refores-
tation. For instead of thirty years
we could have every acre In we'll de-.
veloped farms in 10 years from
today.
. Mr.. Alexander has done us this
much good, If we are wide awake
he has brought directly to our at
tention the peril of committing our
parish to policy of reforestation.
I II we accept his counsel and go into
the business of reforesting the par
sish by entering into his proposed re-
forestation contracts, then we admit
there is some reason for inference
IN his statement that it will be zoo
years before this parish again Is as
well settled as it is today.
ss But we propose to show in articles
next week and the following that
these reforestation contracts will be
detrimental to the landowners as
well as to the townspeople and bus1-
ness interests of the parish.
The Police Jury must not be per-
mitted to approve these contracts,
and they must be shown clearly that.
to do so will bankrupt the, parish
We have the facts and we are going
to show them. But, of course, those
who are financially interested are the
ones to decide the matter. l am as.
sured already by land, timber, and
other interests that my position con-
cerning these proposed contracts IS
IN accord with their own, and pro-.
pose to go no further than to help
them in what is everybody fight
who desires the progress and welfare
OF this parish.
" BORN-To Mrs. Emile Becnel (nee
Ira Chaize), on Sunday, Oct. lbth,
1922, a girl.
Mr.. and Mrs. Gas SECOND returned
Thursday from a ten-months trip to
France. While there they visited all