The timber forest is the most general form of silvicultural management.
Selection forest with 150 to 200 year rotations is practised in the Alps
and in the smaller private forest areas. Shelterwood system in
compartments is in use in other parts (with a rotation of 60 to 80 years
in the deciduous, and 80 to 120 years in conifer forest), supplanting
largely the clearing and planting system which had found favor during
the middle of last century.
In corporation forests, large areas are still under coppice with
standards, but will probably soon be converted into timber forest, a
policy favored by cantonal instructions. Pure coppice is only rarely
met, usually confined to the overflow lands and small private holdings.
In some of the public forests in the French territory it is practised
with a “double rotation” (_furetage_) according to French pattern.
Artificial means to secure complete stands in natural regenerations is
favored by the cantonal regulations, but thinning operations are still
mostly neglected, except where local market for inferior material makes
them advisable, which is mostly in the plains country, where the annual
yield from thinnings may represent 30% of the total harvest yield.
Conversion from coppice and coppice with standards into timber forest,
and change from clearing systems to natural regeneration (proper for
mountain forest), and from pure to mixed forest have become general
provisions of the working plans.
The average cut in the State forests during four years prior to 1893 was
over 64 cub. ft. p. acre, and 42 cub. ft. for the corporation forests;
an average for all the public forests of round 45 cub. ft.,--not a very
good showing as yet. So far, the collection of material for yield tables
and for a statement of increment and stock on hand in the country at
large are still insufficient, although, in 1882, Prof. Landolt estimated
the annual product at little less than 500 million cubic feet, or 50
cubic feet per acre.
Only for the intensively managed city forests of Zürich and the cantonal
forests of Bern are more accurate data available. In the latter, the
State forests yield 50 cubic feet in the plateau country, 73 cubic feet,
in the middle country, and 76 cubic feet in the Jura, while the communal
forests of that canton yield 15, 66 and 56 cubic feet respectively.
Prices for wood are higher in the low country than the average in
Germany and have been steadily rising for the last 40 years, especially
for coniferous saw material which at present brings stumpage prices of
12 to 15 cents.
Owing to these high prices the gross yield of some Swiss forests is the
largest known in Europe; the city forest of Zürich, exhibiting yields of
$12, and the city forest of Aarau as much as $14 per acre on the
average, although in the Alps forests the gross yield sinks to $3 and
$4. The more intensively managed city forests mentioned spend on their
management $6 and even $7 per acre, while most of the State forests keep
their expenditures within $2.50 to $3.50, and in some places down to
$1.50 per acre. The net yields vary therefore for the State and communal
forests of the plateau country between $3 and $6.50 for some of the city
forests from $6.50 to $8 and $9.
Switzerland has long ago ceased to produce its wood requirements, and
imports from 8 to 9 million dollars annually of wood and wood
manufactures.