On a cutting area in the east side yellow pine, which has been under observation for 14 years, practically no progress has been made in obtaining new reproduction. Studies of reproduction on permanent sample plots in California representative of the important types are summarized by Dunning (7)3 thus:

One of the most important results of these studies has been to emphasize the great importance of advance reproduction. It becomes more and more evident that the establishment of reproduction after cutting is a long, tedious process, requiring as high as 20 years or more on poorer sites to secure even a fair stand. In none of the sample plots even on the best sites has more than one third of the seedlings now present been established since cutting, and in only two cases are the number and distribution of seedlings sufficient to constitute complete stocking 10 years after logging.

This applies to conservative cuttings on national forests. The conclusion is unavoidable that, in the main, the preservation of young growth throughout the logging operation, in slash disposal, etc., is the principal means of keeping forest lands productive. This fact must influence particularly the methods of logging used and the intensity and nature of fire protection measures.

Advance reproduction is, however, generally more or less patchy or scattered, and it is therefore necessary to provide for additional young growth after logging. This can be accomplished by reserving small trees of merchantable size to serve as seeders and gradually to restock cut-over areas not already sufficiently productive. Seed trees are also required in case fire after logging should wipe out the advance growth.

Similar conclusions regarding the importance of advance growth and seed trees have been reached in other portions of the western yellow pine region, notably in the Southwest and in eastern Oregon (11, 15).

PROBLEMS OF THE TIMBER OWNER

The owner of forest lands in the California pine region who is engaged in the business of producing lumber faces the following definite facts:

(1) Logging must be done at a profit.

(2) Whether he desires it or not, the landowner is in the cut-over land business on an increasingly large scale.

(3) Cut-over lands are generally of value primarily for timber growing. The demand for cut-over land for grazing, agriculture, and recreation is exceedingly local and small.

(4) The value of cut-over land to the owner (beyond a nominal value of bare land) therefore depends on the amount and character of young growth and seed trees remaining after logging. This is equally true whether the land is held and managed as part of his own going operation, or whether it be sold to some one who will manage it for timber production. Such purchasers as may exist can pick and choose, because of the already large area of cut-over land. They will not pay and can not be expected to pay for values (young growth and seed trees) which do not exist (2).

(5) Existing methods of exploitation do not generally leave cutover lands productive (fig. 2).

Italic numbers in parentheses refer to " Literature cited," p. 75.

(6) To keep going an existing operation, with a heavy investment in plant, transportation, and equipment and with established markets, a new crop of timber must be grown on the lands now being logged. The condition of cut-over lands is then equally important whether this grower of forests is the private owner or the public, for the physical things necessary to produce a forest are identical in either case. The permanence of the operator's timber supply depends largely on whether he adopts steps that will produce timber crops on his cut-over land. No mere shift in ownership of land can possibly offset the long-continued effects of destructive lumbering.

LAND

Only a single severe summer fire in the slash left from logging was needed to reduce this forest land to an unproductive waste one step removed from desert. Centuries will perhaps be required to reestablish a complète forest cover by natural means.

(7) The public has declared its interest in the fate of cut-over lands by substantial contributions of cash for protection against fire, and obviously expects similar action from timber owners.

These make the real "economic problems" that confront the forest owner. They overshadow the commonly recognized and highly important tax and carrying charge questions, and any businesslike consideration of the future of his timber operations must start with them,

Thus the owner of forest land in considering the first steps in growing timber as an integral part of his business, requires answers to several definite and practical questions:

What steps in logging, slash disposal, and fire protection are essential to leaving cut-over lands reasonably productive?

Are these steps practical, and what is their cost above the usual. measures now taken on private lands?

74722°-26- -2

What returns can be expected in growth of timber if these steps are taken?

In working out the answers to these questions two different groups of controlling factors must constantly be kept in mind and balanced one against the other. These are, on the one hand, the life history of the forest itself, particularly its manner of reproduction; on the other hand, the process of exploitation and subsequent care and treatment of cut-over lands. It is hopeless to violate the intrinsic needs of the forest and expect the forest to continue; it is equally hopeless to propose desirable but unduly costly and impracticable methods of logging, slash disposal, or fire protection, and expect them to be followed by a strongly competitive industry.

To talk of planting as a remedy for destructive logging is to beg the question. Because of high cost (not less than $12 to $15 an acre), difficulty of the operation, particularly on stony ground, uncertainty of success owing to imperfectly established methods, and lack of forest nurseries, planting is a last resort. It is likely to be employed only where natural reproduction fails. The opportunity for timber growing in the California pine region lies primarily in saving what is already in existence. The young growth and seed trees already on the ground represent the only real basis for a new forest. The simple steps necessary to leave cut-over land productive must be taken as part of the logging operation.

In discussing the problem of the operator who wishes to maintain the productivity of his timberland, it is necessary to consider not only the practical questions now confronting him but also the causes which have brought about the existing situation. Throughout its history the lumber industry has treated forest land as a mine from which to remove valuable accumulations rather than as a possible source of successive wood crops. This practice has resulted naturally from the enormous reservoirs of virgin stumpage available and from the highly competitive nature of the business, which have forced rapid and cheap exploitation.

As a consequence of the urge for production and of the general indifference to the fate of cut-over lands, three major factors of denudation of forest land have come into existence in California. These are fire, methods of logging, and intensity of cutting. A fourth factor, overgrazing or unregulated grazing, is also of occasional importance.

Broadcast burning of slash and uncontrolled fires on cut-over lands have certainly been responsible for a large share of the denudation in the past, and this factor has been recognized and discussed almost to the exclusion of methods of logging and closeness of cutting. In late years, however, the high lead and high speed methods of power logging, and clear cutting in pure pine types, have come to be recognized as belonging definitely in the class of major factors of denudation.

These three factors must be considered by the logging operator who wishes to maintain the productivity of his timberland, and who is therefore interested in determining, (1) the cause of losses in productivity now taking place and, (2) the means of reducing or eliminating such losses without serious disruption of existing practices or serious additional cost,

FIRE PROTECTION AND SLASH DISPOSAL

THE GENERAL PROTECTIVE SYSTEM

The general protective system applying to all forest lands should be intensive enough to prevent serious damage to merchantable timber or advance reproduction. Success in growing timber demands that the average yearly burned area shall not exceed onefifth of 1 per cent of the entire forest area. This rate of loss will not seriously reduce the productive area of a forest property in the 75 to 100 years required to produce a new timber crop. On the other hand, a figure even approaching the present 2 per cent to 3 per cent of cut-over lands burned annually will so greatly cut into the timber growth and leave so much land with no commercial forest that profitable management becomes impossible. Systematic fire protection before, during, and after logging is thus a measure of prime importance.

Since preservation of advance reproduction is so important in continuing the stand, it follows that broadcast burning of the virgin forests should be avoided, because even light surface fires destroy most if not all of the young growth. Light or controlled burning has been found a futile and costly expedient for reducing hazard in the forest (14). The practice is difficult to carry out, involves material sacrifices of both mature timber and reproduction, and thus leads to the very sort of loss it seeks to prevent. The insignificant reduction of hazard accomplished by light burning is Soon more than offset by increase of inflammable material created by burning. Therefore "light burning" has no place in even the crudest attempt at timber growing.

Wherever fire occurs in virgin forests the minimum damage is the serious reduction of the advance reproduction and the burning down of occasional mature trees.

Years of experience of the Forest Service show that with large and somewhat broken holdings an annual expenditure of 1.5 to 2.5 cents per acre per year for an organization for suppression of fires will result in less than 1 per cent per year burned over. Most timber owners buy protection of their lands from the Forest Service at the rates applicable to national forest lands. This expenditure is, however, inadequate, to guarantee protection on compact holdings of a few thousand acres. Some owners recognize this and insist on more intensive protection. Also as timber becomes more valuable the scale of protection will inevitably be raised.

For adequate protection on the smaller or more compact holdings a general average expenditure of at least 3 to 4 cents per acre per year will be needed, using the type of organization developed on the national forests. This includes the retiring of investment in telephone, trails, and other protection improvement, wages of fire guards, and suppression costs. It provides, in the virgin forest, one-hour control, or an organization capable of putting suppression forces on a fire within one hour after its start. On cut-over lands the general protective system should provide half-hour control, at an average yearly cost of 6 to 8 cents an acre.

A standard fire-control system provides for systematic detection of fires, for rapid transmission of messages concerning location of fires, for dispatchers to initiate action, 1 for guards to start suppression work, together with the necessary tools, equipment, Beans of transport, and roads and trails.

SLASH DISPOSAL

On cut-over lands, two factors account for a set of problems that do not exist in the virgin forest and that require a more specialized system of protection. These are slash disposal and the logging operation itself as a source of fires.

The large quantity of slash from the trees that have been cut, added to the advance reproduction and brush present before logging, gives cut-over areas in any type possibilities of fires far more intense, more damaging, and more difficult to combat than in the virgin forest. One of the prime necessities in fire protection is thus reduction of the slash hazard, and the breaking of cut-over areas into blocks so that control of fires may be assured. Several methods of slash disposal are already in use in the pine region.

BROADCAST BURNING

In the past, it has been a common practice on private lands to burn the slash broadcast, which simply means touching it off as it lies after the logs have been removed, and stopping the resulting fire when it reaches virgin timber. Frequently, too, fires starting during logging, generally from the operations themselves, have been allowed to burn, with essentially the same effect as fires deliberately set. An example of the maximum destructiveness of broadcast summer burning of slash was encountered on private land in the yellow pine type on the east side of the Sierras, logged in 1914 and burned over the following year. The slash, to be sure, was completely consumed, but the considerable quantity of advance reproduction and a number of seed trees that had survived logging were completely wiped out. A strip run on this area showed in 112 miles just two seedlings and no live seed trees. The brush which is now in possession of the ground is a species indicative of a nontimber site, showing that besides destroying the young growth the fire ruined the soil itself, leaving it incapable of sustaining forest trees for many years to come.

Many cases were found in which part of a cutting area had been broadcast burned while part had escaped fire. The result of such treatment is the wiping out of the new forest on burned ground, and the occupation of the land by worthless brush. In contrast, particularly on older cuttings, the unburned lands generally are in fair shape, with advance reproduction and seed trees. Slash fires usually wipe out not only the smaller reproduction but seed trees as well, so that the return of the forest is a matter of decades.

The minimum effect of slash fires is the destruction of advance reproduction and the death of some seed trees. Such fires, however, do not completely consume the slash, and the fire hazard, which the burn aims to reduce, remains but little lower than if the slash were left untouched. The rapid invasion of the brush is also aided by broadcast burning (fig. 3).

Even where only minimum damage results on part of a slash burn, it is not uncommon to find complete destruction on another portion of the same area. Extensive fires are so uncertain in their action that it is impossible to control their effect on the forest.