All ordinances issued by the princes to regulate the management of their
properties contain the prescription, that permission of the _Landesherr_
is necessary for clearings, and that abandoned fields growing up to wood
are to be kept as woodland; this partly for timber needs, partly for
considerations of the chase. Still, Frederick the Great in colonizing
East Prussia, expressed himself to the effect that he cared more for men
than for wood, and enjoined his officials to colonize especially the
woods far from water, which entailed even more waste of wood than where
means of transportation allowed at least partial marketing.
Improvident clearings proceeded even under his reign on the Frische
Nehrung between Danzig and Pillau, and started the shifting sands of
that peninsula.
In the absence of all knowledge as regards the extent of existing
supplies or of the increment, and with poor means of transportation, at
least local distress was imminent.
To stave off a threatening timber scarcity, regulation in the use of
wood was attempted by the forest ordinances, even to the extent of
forbidding the hanging out of green brush to designate a drinking hall,
or the cutting of May trees,--similar to our crusade in the United
States against the use of Christmas trees. A diameter limit to which
trees might be permitted to be cut, was also frequently urged.
Regulation of forest use did not confine itself to the princely
properties alone, but, in the interest of the whole, the restrictions
were extended to all owners. These restrictions were directed either to
the practice in the exploitation of the forest or in the use of the
material. In the latter direction the attempts at reducing the
consumption of building timber are of special interest. Building
inspectors were to approve building plans and inspect buildings to see
that they were most economically constructed; that repairs were made
promptly, to avoid the necessity of more extensive ones; that new
buildings replacing old ones were not built higher than the old ones. In
Saxony, as early as 1560, it was ordered that the whole house must be
built of stone, while elsewhere, the building of stone base walls and
the use of brick roofs instead of shingles was insisted upon.
Even the number of houses in any community was restricted. Fences were
to be supplanted by hedges and ditches. Economies in charcoal burning,
in potash manufacture for glass works, and in the turpentine industry
were prescribed, and about 1600, the burning of potash for fertilizer
was forbidden entirely; but these laws proved unavailing. Even in
fuel-wood a saving was to be effected by using only the poorer woods and
windfalls, by instituting public bake ovens (still in use in
Westphalia), by improving stoves, restricting the number of bathing
rooms, etc.
The consumption of fuelwood seems to have been enormous, for we find
record of 200 cords used by one family in a year and of 1,200 cords or
more used by the Court at Weimar during the same time.
The substitution of turf and coal for firewood was ordered in some
sections in 1697 and again in 1777, but practically not until 1780 did
coal come in as a substitute. Tanbark peeling was also forbidden, or
only the use of bark of trees soon to be felled was allowed. For
cooperage only the top-dry oak; for coffins only soft-wood, or,
according to Joseph II of Austria, no wood, but black cloth was to be
used. In some parts of the country the use of oak was restricted, even
as early as 1562.
For regulating practices in the forest the restrictions often took only
the general form of forbidding devastation, without specifying what that
meant.
Then, besides establishing a diameter limit, and regulating pasture in
order to protect young growth, excluding sheep and goats entirely, an
attempt was made to secure at least orderly procedure in the fellings.
Foresters were to designate what was to be cut even for firewood.
Marking irons and hammers were employed for this purpose by the middle
of the 15th century (usually two markings, by forester and by inspector
to check). And this designation by officials extended even into the
private forest, where finally no felling was allowed without previous
permission and designation by a forester.
The use of the litter by the small farmers had grown to a large extent
in these times and it was thought desirable to stop it, but this aid to
the poor peasant was so necessary that only regulating the gathering of
it could be insisted upon.
It must be understood that all these various attempts at securing a
conservative forest use were by no means general but refer to
circumscribed territory, and much of it was only paper legislation
without securing actual practice.