The oldest record of attempts at an orderly management in any part of
the empire seems to date back to the 12th century, when the city forest
of Vienna had been placed under management. During the 16th and 17th
century this property appears to have been managed upon the basis of
careful surveys and estimates. We also find a definite forest
organization in the forests attached to the ducal salt mines in Styria
by 1524, and the dams, canals and water works for floating timber
developed by 1592 through Thomas Seeauer were the wonder of the times.
In 1524 also, Archbishop _Mathæus Lang of Wellenburg_ issued a forest
ordinance which was full of wise prescriptions, probably little heeded.
A forest ordinance of 1599 refers to burning of tops and care of young
growth in fellings.
Generally speaking, as in Germany proper, forest ordinances were issued
from time to time, by the dukes under the theory of the _Forsthoheit_,
applying to limited territories and attempting to regulate forest use.
No uniformity existed.
The iron industry in the more northern provinces had led early to a more
conservative use of forest properties for fuel, and since the mines were
regal property the dukes had a special interest in their conservation.
In the Alp territory, especially in Styria, the regal right to the mines
combined with the _Forsthoheit_ led early to the reservation by the
dukes of whatever forest was not fenced or owned by special grant for
the use of the mines. In addition, a superior right was asserted by them
in some of the private forests to all the forest produce beyond the
personal requirements of the owners, for use of the mines at a small
tax; and what other private property existed was burdened by innumerable
rights of user. The exercise of these rights, and the warfare against
irksome restrictions led to widespread illegal exploitation and
devastation, which as early as the 15th century had proceeded to such an
extent that in Tyrol associations for protection against the torrents
were already then in existence. Yet in this province, scantily
populated, with one-third of its area unproductive and one-third
forested, wasteful exploitation continued until recent times.
In Krain, which was unusually well wooded, forest reservations were
made for the use of the mines and furnaces in 1510 and 1515, these
reservations comprising all forest lands within a given radius. The
balance was mostly divided among small owners, whose unrestricted,
unconservative exploitation continued into the latter half of the 19th
century.
In Styria, nearly one-half wooded and one-third unproductive, a
regulated management was attempted as early as 1572, and by subsequent
forest ordinances of 1695, 1721 and 1767 devastation was to be checked.
But the resistance of the peasants to the regulations and the
inefficiency of the forest service were such that no substantial
improvement resulted.
In Galicia, unusually extensive rights of user in the crown forests led
to their devastation, and the attempts to regulate the exercise of these
rights by ordinances in 1782 and 1802 were unsuccessful.
The forest area along the coast of the Adriatic in Istria and Dalmatia
had furnished shiptimber even to the ancients. The Venetians becoming
the owners of the country in the 15th century declared all forests
national property, reserved for shiptimber, and placed them under
management. They instituted a forest service, regulated pasturing, and
forbade clearing. The oak coppice was to be cut in 8 to 12 year
rotation, with standards to be left for timber, etc. A reorganization of
this service with division into districts is recorded in the 16th
century, when Charles V, in 1520, instituted a “forest college,” i.e.,
administration. But the district officers, _capitani ai boschi_, being
underpaid, carried on a nefarious trade on their own account, and by
1775, the whole country was already ruined in spite of attempts at
reform; the “_Karst_” problem remained unsolved; and, when Austria
secured Dalmatia, in 1897, that country too was found in the same
deplorable condition, the forest area, there in the hands of the
peasants, having suffered by pasture and indiscriminate cutting.
It was the work of Maria Theresa to reform the administration of the
various branches of government, and wholesome legislation was also
extended to the forest branch by her forest ordinance of 1754, which
remained in force until 1852. It relieved the private owners, who held
most of the forest area, from the restrictions hitherto imposed, except
in the frontier forests. These, for strategic reasons, were to be
managed according to special working plans prepared by the “patriotic
economic society.” The management of communal forests also was specially
regulated. Otherwise the ordinance merely recommended in general terms
orderly system and the stopping of abuses.
In 1771, another forest ordinance proposed to extend the same policy of
private unrestricted ownership to the Karst forests, with the idea that
thereby better conditions would most likely be secured; but, since here
the property was not as in Bohemia in large estates but in small
farmers’ hands, the result was disastrous, as we shall see later: it
merely led to increased devastation.
The same result followed the increase of private peasant ownership which
came with the abolishment of serfdom in 1781. In 1782, an ordinance full
of wise prescriptions against wasteful practice intended for the
Northwest territory sought to check the improvident forest destruction.
A further wholesome influence on private forest management was exercised
by the tax assessment reform in 1788, when not only a more reasonable
assessment but for the first time a difference was made in taxation of
managed as opposed to unmanaged woods and the epoch-making fertile idea
of the normal forest was announced (see p. 115). At the same time the
hunting privileges and other burdens, hampering forest properties were
abolished, and measures for the extinguishment of the rights of user
enacted.