The Chronicle-star combined with the Moss Point advertiser., 1948-06-11

WTIl(At ~ OllaAt Aa1 ~ ~ oaAAh
This forest and others like il
throughout the South seemed in
exhaustible and to contain suffi-
cient timber to supply the world
for all time. About this time and
a few years later intensive lum-
bering BEGAN.
Some 80 years later this vir-
gin forest had vanished and left
scattered throughout this section
las throughout the timbered
areas of most Of the South ghost
sawmill towns. The hum of the
| saw had been hushed and happy
workers and their families who
had earned their daily bread in
these industries were forced to
migrate to other fields. The virgin
timber had disappeared leaving
millions of acres of denuded APP
parently worthless lands, so we
in this area, as well as in the
| South as a whole, regarded our
selves through as lumber pro-
ducers and manufacturers Of for
est products, for in visualizing a
forest we had thought only in
terms of virgin timber, giving no
heed and placing no value upon
the few stands of second growth
appearing around in spots here
and there. But wait, Mother
Earth in her provision for man
had a surprise for us. There began
peeping up out of the grass all
over this country small pine seed
lings-either seeded in prior to
the cutting of virgin stands or
sprinping from seed trees uninten-
tionany Tin most cases) left be-
hind logging operations.
Didn't Realize value
We were at first unable to ac-
cept these small trees as poten-
tial timber, and unable to recog-
nize that such would revolution
he forestry In this rel and IN
the South and become immense
ly more valuable to our people
than were our vanished virgin
stands. ayF
Among those who did recognize
the value of these small trees,
however, were paper mills of New
England and Northern states
where slow-growing pulpwood
was becoming both scarce and ex-
pensive. The migration to the
South of these papermilis and
other woodworking industries us
ing small trees as raw material
has possibly done more, not only
to increase the value of young
trees, but more toward the pro-
lection, conservation and replen-
ishment of such than any other
one agency, and also to encour-
age the private land owner to
grow trees. Many land owners
are slow toward an attempt to
reforest their denuded lands
through fear Of being unable to
realize from same during their
own lifetime.
AS just one example that it
will pay the owner to plant and
to grow trees in Mississippi, the
International Paper company
planted in Jackson county dur
ing March, 1925, eleven and three
quarter acres of slash pine-such
being known as the Sam Byrd
plantation. This company has
thinned this plantation three
times for pulpwood, cutting out
q total of 1929 cords per acre
and there remains today a care
fully estimated $3.50 cords per
acre, making a total of 46.79
cords per acre produced in the
twenty-five years, or an average
of 90 cords per acre per year.
Resurrection of Forests
Our forests are being truly res
directed and accepted not only
as our only renewable nat
ural resources, but. Is our
most important economic as
set. Most users of trees have
accepted the philosophy of selec-
tive cutting, and we e many
sawmills some of which are
built on the foundation of former
mills cut out and abandoned al
quarter century ago when they
thought their timber was gone
forever, now on a sustained
yield, with means to perpetuate
their operation through select
i've cutting and the growing of
trees as fast as they cut them.
In fact the man who f'clear cuts
his timber is not only ~injuring
himself but is burning the bridge
over which some future fellow
traveller might cross the stream.
In keeping with the effort of
the agriculturist to make two
blades of grass OF. two stalks of
corn grow Where only M grew
before, the forest owner ear and
must make a dozen trees grow
where only one grew before. The
expansion of the wood pulp and
other wood using industries in
the South calls formore and more
trees. The South-Mississippi-
our Gulf Coast can and must
grow these trees to meet an ever