The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1924-04-28
NEW INDUSTRY FOR THE SOUTH

ID! the proper management of our tim
bered areas the South may not only continue
to be the nations chief source of lumber, but
1t may also be made to become producer of
pulp wood for white and wrapping papers in
quantity sufficient to supply the United
States perpetually with an important annual
surplus for export. 1t is estimated that the
South has quarter of billion acres of
land that is especially suited for the growing
of timber, and which awaits only the pro.
gressive and cooperative enterprise of states
industries, organizations and land owners to
become a producer of revenue far beyond the
dreams of those who first denuded this land
of its virgin timber. Some areas rapidly re-
produce timber while other areas must be
replanted In either ease, there must be pro-
lection against fires and against wasteful
timbering methods. The South has an i'm
measurable advantage over the North in this
respect, because Southern pine will produce
four times as fast as Northern pine and
spruce, At present, however, the timber
supply is rapidly vanishing, because it is
being cut seven times as rapidly as it is be-
ing reproduced. 1t is possible to administer
these same areas in such manner as to
cause reproduction greatly to exceed legiti-
mate and scientific cutting of either timber
or pulp wood.
Several firms in the South are turning
their attention to an intelligent administra-
ton of their opportunity in this direction.
One of these concerns is the Seaboard
Air Line Railway, which had an exhibit at
the recent National Paper Industries Ex-
position showing the plup-wood and timber
resources of its territory. This railway is
sued booklet at the exposition printed on
paper made at Madison, Wisconsin, by the
sulphate process out of Southern pines and
gums furnished by the railway. In the
booklet the railway gave out this message:
Investigation of the growth of pine timber
in the six states traversed by the Seaboard
Air Line Railway, namely, Virginia, North
Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama
and Virginia. proves that timber viii regrow
to pulp sizef in twenty years. All of the
cut-over pine lands of the Southern states,
offer unlimited possibilities for the regrowth
of the pulp supply. The low marshy lands
of the river$ afford plentiful supply Of
rapidly growing gum woods. . In addition
to the supply now standing, accurate data
shows that a growth of two cords of wood
per acre per year may be obtained on South
ern lands under proper forestry manage
ment.'
Taking these figures as basis, the Manu-
facturers Record estimates that on the quar-
under sustained yield management, the an
nual YIELD "a the low basis of oneNand half
cords per acre, will be around three hundred
million cords. The largest consumption of
pulp wood for the country, including all i'm
ports. for any one year was 6,114,072 cords,
consuAed in 1920" Thus this nation does
not need TO look to Canada with its plan
to restrict export of pulp wood, nor to far
away Alaska with its at present inaccessible
areas of spruce, but only to the easily &C.
cessible and organized Southland for abun-
dant tonnage of both pulp wood and lumber
for all computable future requirements.
Another institution seeking TO develop
the pulp-wood industry in the South is the
Great Southern Lumber Company of Louis
lana, which. according to the Manufacturers
Record, lis making study of yields per acre
of timber land under scientific management
in cooperation with the Southern Forest
Experiment Station, over a block of two
hundred acres. Seed trees and immature
trees are tagged, measured and mapped, and
will be remeasured at stated intervals in
order to ascertain the yields under various
methods of sustained yield management. The
company has announced that by the time its
immense holdings are exhausted as timber
lands its paper-making industry will have
developed to take the place of the lumber
business, and it will thus make an easy
transition from numbering to paper-making
from its 'own pulp, produced on the scientific
plan of sustained-y yield management. The
reasons for the selection of the South are !:
first, the South already has sufficient stands
of virgin and secondgrowth timber to en-
able the industry to make its start and to
maintain it for several years; and, second,
the South will grow pulp wood four times as
fast as the forests of the North. For while
Southern pine will grow to pulp wood size in
an average of twenty years, Northern spruce
requires eighty years to attain the same
size
To show how paper companies regard this
section it may be stated that in 1928 fifty.
eight paper mills located in the South and
the earlier ones are already charging their
capacities. alhis is an industry which Ala
bama canawsll afford to invite by means of
such provision as will stimulate the conser-
walton and reproduction of her timber.
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