Askov American. [volume] (Askov, Pine County, Minn.) 1914-current, 1928-05-03
METHODS OF TIMBER GROWING
AND LOGGING in THE LAKE
STATES DESCRIBED

land, according to DR.. Raphael Zon,
director of the Lake States Forest Ex-
pertinent Station, Forest Service,
United States Department of Agri-
culture. For the Industries which re-
quire timber reserves, he says, these
lands, if managed to provide a grow
ing timber crop, can be made just as
valuable reserves as stands of ma
ture timber.
1t is significant, says Doctor Zon,
that of the total area of forest lands
in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Mime
sofa, less than IS per cent contains old
merchandise timber, while 46 per
cent is in second growth and nearly
Sc per cent is unproductive cut-over
land The large area of low grade
soils of little or no prospective value
for agriculture, the slow ABSORPTION
into agriculture of suitable lands, the
accommodating taxes on unproductive
stump lands, increasing financial diff
ficulties of communities located in
areas where the forest industries are
failing for lack of raw material, and
rising prices for timber and pulpwood
all are causing forest-land owners in
this region to inquire more and more
into the possibilities of timber grow
ing as the best practicable solution.
To prevent timberland from becom-
ing barren the principal steps to be
taken are O fireproofing the woods.
as far as possible, by slash burning
or other ways of reducing the fire
danger from slash or debris left after
cutting, and (2) keeping fire out of
the woods thereafter by protective
organization for detecting and fighting
fires. .
ANY forest landowner, however, who
is going into the growing of timber
crops will want to do more than
merely protect his cut-over land from
fire, in order to utilize to the fullest
possible extent the productive capa-
city of his soil. This involves more
or less intensive forest management,
which, it has been found, often pays
where crude forestry practice may not.
The basis of forest management is
sustained yield, or continuous timber
production. In the practice of for
estry on this basis, cutting is done
under the "selective" system, by
which young reproduction is safe
guarded, and control of the most val
liable species is obtained by favoring
these and cutting out the less valu-
able ones. Release cuttings, Trimmings
and underplantings also are practised.
and where advisable. paintings to
stock barren lands. Good forest man
agement also may involve certain pro-
tective measures against diseases and
insects.
Prescribing what he terms first
aid to reforestation'', Doctor Zon de-
clares that fire prevention is the key
to the situation. Slash disposal is an
effective means of reducing the fire
hazard. Other first aids" are good
logging practice-cutting to a certain
diameter limit and saving young and
understandable trees-and stabiliza-
ton of forest taxation, in which the
Lake States already are making con-
siderable progress.
Doctor Zon recommends progressive
burning of slash at the time of log
ging as the best method of slash dis
posal in the Lake States. This, he
says, often pays its own way by re-
,ducing the cost of logging through
clearing the woods of brush to make
way for skidding.
There are other recommendations
embodying what are considered the
best known methods of logging prac-
tice and timber growing in the Lake
States, are presented in new bulletin
by Doctor Zon, just published as De-
partment of Agriculture Bulletin No.
1496-D Timber Growing and Logging
Practice in the Lake States" This is
one of series of bulletins presenting
the measures necessary to keep forest
land productive in the II principal
forest regions of the United States.
In this bulletin, designed as a prac-
rtical manual for timberland owners,
Doctor Zon gives in detail the actual
methods, with costs and much other
data, calculated to make timber grow
ing a profitable enterprise in the Lake
States.
In an introduction to the bulletin,
Col. William B. Greeley, chief of the
Forest Service, says:
1--WE know enough now to go right
ahead. Believing that forest land
owners in the United States are ready
now to engage in timber growing on
a large scale, the Forest Service has
endeavored to place before them in
concise terms the best guides which
the experience of this country to date
affords.
I'm the last so years American
wood-using industries Of many kinds
have become accustomed to holding
timber reserves behind their plants.
They pay carrying charges on these
reserve supplies-often 20 or 80 years
as a matter of course, in order to
protect their plant investments and
hold their trade. 1t is but a slight
modification of the same principle to
carry a reserve, not in the form of
costly old-grOWth Stumpage but of