The forest area has at various times and by various authorities been
roughly estimated as between one and a quarter and over one and three
quarter million square miles, which would make the forest per cent. at
least over 32. But this includes the open woodlands of the northern
territory and of the prairies, which, while of great importance to the
local settlers, are for the most part probably or surely not of
commercial value. Commercially valuable forests, actually or
prospectively, are found almost only in British Columbia and in the old
provinces, the two forest regions separated, just as in the United
States, by a forestless region, except that north of the prairie region
a continuous belt of open woodland extends to near the mouth of the
Mackenzie River. A careful examination of the sources of information has
led the writer to the conclusion that less than 350,000 square miles or
round 200 million acres would cover fully the commercially valuable
forest land, although the wooded area of the provinces in which the
commercial timber occurs is stated officially as around 450 million
acres, two-fifths of which is to be found in British Columbia.
Indeed, although we are accustomed to look upon Canada as a great forest
country, it really possesses about 60 per cent. less commercial forest
area than the United States, and about one-quarter of the mature timber
of that country. It will be understood that all such statistics are
merely rough estimates, the data being slim, and eked out by conjectures
based on geographical conditions which predicate the character of the
country. Most unreasonable speculations and calculations[16] as to
amount of timber standing and value have been made on impossible
assumptions.
[16] As an instance, one statistician by mere mathematical figuring,
namely, deducting the known crop and pasture area from the total
land area would make the forest area of Quebec alone over 209
million acres. This includes the country north of the Height of
Land, of 163 million acres, which by another mathematical
calculation is made to be able to furnish over 65 billion feet of
lumber, besides over 600 million cords of pulpwood and 370 million
railroad ties; but under present conditions, owing to topography and
character of the timber it cannot be utilized and its commercial
value is altogether problematic. This calculation would leave as
really or potentially available forest land south of the Height of
Land 46 million acres in addition to over 5 million on farms. It is
claimed that this forest area may still produce some 110 billion
feet of coniferous and 1.5 billion feet of hardwoods, or 2500 feet
to the acre.
The chief of the provincial Forest Service lately made the forest
area of the province 131 million acres, including 2 million acres of
waste land.
While by the change of standards and by local needs, forest areas may
become commercially valuable which were not so considered before, and
thereby the above figures may be eventually increased, from the
standpoint of valuable lumber supply for the world trade, the above
named area may be assumed to set the limit for the present.
A computation based on slender information has placed the country with
open woodlands in the central region as exceeding 280,000 square miles.
The Director of Forestry estimated that 150,000 square miles of this
area might contain nearly 200 billion feet merchantable timber.
The southeastern territory south of the Height of Land was originally
all densely wooded. From it a farm area of round 25 million acres has
been cut out, less than 7 per cent. of the land area included.
Especially the south-western half of Ontario, between the Great Lakes,
which contains the most fertile land, is densely settled, as also the
shores of the St. Lawrence. A large part of the remaining forest area is
cut over and culled, especially for pine; the amount of White Pine
remaining according to estimates made in 1895 would now be less than 20
billion feet. Extensive areas have been turned into semi-barrens by
repeated fires.
The Statistician of the Dominion in his report made in that year comes
to the conclusion that “the first quality pine has nearly disappeared”
and that “we are within measurable distance of the time when, with the
exception of spruce as to wood, and of British Columbia as to Provinces,
Canada shall cease to be a wood exporting country.”
The composition in general is the same as that of the northern forest in
the United States: hardwoods (birch, maple and elm prevailing) with
conifers mixed, the latter, especially spruce, becoming occasionally
pure. The nearly pure hardwood forest of the southern Ontario peninsula
has been almost entirely supplanted by farms, and here, even for
domestic fuel, coal, imported from the United States, is largely
substituted for wood. Although White Pine, the most important staple is
found in all parts of this forest region, the best and largest supplies
are now confined to the region north of Georgian Bay. Unopened spruce
and fir lands still abound especially in Quebec on the Gaspé peninsula
and northward. Spruce forms also the largest share in the composition of
the New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland forest, the pine in the
first two provinces having practically been cut out. Extensive, almost
pure Balsam Fir forest, fit for pulp wood, still covers the plateau of
Cape Breton, while Prince Edward Island is to the extent of 60 per cent.
cleared for agricultural use.
Much of this Eastern forest area is not only culled of its best timber,
but burnt over, and thereby deteriorated in its composition, the
inferior Balsam Fir appearing in largest number in the reproduction.
North of the Height of Land, in Ungava and westward, spruce continues to
timber line, but, outside of narrow belts following the river valleys,
only in open stand, branchy, and stunted, hardly fit even for pulp, for
the most part with birch and aspen intermixed. This open spruce forest,
interspersed among muskegs continues more or less to the northern tundra
and across the continent to within a few miles of the mouth of the
Mackenzie River and the Arctic Ocean, the White Spruce being the most
northern species. In the interior, northern prairie belt, groves of
aspen, dense and well developed, skirt the water courses and form an
important wood supply.
The forests of British Columbia partake of the character of the Pacific
forest of the United States, the Coast Range along the coast for about
200 miles being stocked with conifers of magnificent development,
Douglas Fir, Giant Arborvitæ, Hemlock, Bull Pine and a few others, the
Rocky Mountain range also of coniferous growth, pine and larch, but of
inferior character, large areas being covered with Alpine Fir (_Abies
lasiocarpa_) and Lodgepole Pine, important as soilcover and for local
use in the mining districts, but lacking in commercial value.
If much of the forest area in the settled provinces is burnt over and
damaged by forest fire, much more extensive destruction is wrought in
this northern forest by fires sweeping annually over millions of acres
unchecked, many of them said to be started by lightning. About 50 per
cent. of this country is said to be fire-swept.
Among the large notable forest fires the great Miramichi fire in New
Brunswick in 1825 destroyed more than 6,000 square miles in a few hours.
In 1880 the loss by forest fires in the Ottawa valley alone was still
estimated at $5,000,000 annually. In 1909, reports indicate over half a
million acres burnt over in that year.
The river systems of Eastern Canada, with the mighty St. Lawrence
permitting sea-going vessels to come up to Montreal, have been most
potent factors in the development of the lumber industry and export
trade, without the need of railroads. Yet although, as a consequence
this trade was early developed to a relatively large figure, it has not
grown at as rapid a rate as might have been expected, and to-day with an
export in excess of imports of less than 40 million dollars is
considerably below that of the United States.
The small export trade of earlier times, having been stimulated by
exempting Canadian timber from paying duties in the home country, or at
least allowing it a preferential tariff, had by 1820 grown to 15 million
cubic feet, all squared timber, and sent to England. In 1830, it had
crept up to only 20 million cubic feet, but by 1850, it amounted to over
50 million cubic feet, two-fifths of which was sawed material, the 2632
mills being reported by the Census (1851) as having cut 776 million feet
B.M. By 1867, when the Dominion was formed, the total export of forest
products had advanced in value to $18 million; the next decade, with a
climax year in 1873 of $26 million, saw an increase to $20 million in
the average, the proportion of sawn material being nearly three times
that of hewn wood, and the entire cut of Ontario going to the United
States. At that time it was computed that the waste of value in shipping
square timber amounted for the province of Ontario alone still to over
$350,000 annually. At present sawed lumber, deals, boards, planks, etc.,
form 70 per cent. of the total export.
In the last 20 years a steady increase in exports at an average rate of
about 3 per cent. per annum is noted, the total in 1903 culminating at
nearly $41 million, but in the following year sinking to 36.7 million.
In 1910, the total export amounted to $53 million, against which an
import of nearly $16 million is to be offset, nearly double what it was
three years before. Adding wood manufactures, the net export must be
increased by some $36 million. The bulk of the export goes, of course,
to the United States. But, while exports of forest products thus
increased absolutely, relatively to other exports they have considerably
declined, i.e., the lumber industry has not grown proportionally to
other developments, for while, in 1868, forest products formed 34 per
cent. of the total export, in 1904 they represented only about half
that figure.
The same conclusion, namely that the lumber business has not increased
rapidly in the last 25 years, may be derived from the report of the
Decennial Census. While, for 1890, the total cut amounted to over 5
billion feet and its value to nearly $80 million, in 1900, the cut or at
least the Census report fell below 4 billion and its value to $53
million. In 1909, the total lumber cut was reported as 3.8 billion feet
B. M. and its value $62.8 million.
A measure of the depletion of the great staple White Pine is found in
the statement that from 1865 to 1893 the average size of pieces
decreased by one-quarter to one-third, and that, in 1863, over 23
million cubic feet were exported from Quebec as against 1.5 million feet
in 1904, while the price had more than quadrupled in that period. Spruce
has here taken the place of pine, and Ontario is now the main producer
of pine. Yet in 1909, the White Pine cut in amount almost equaled that
of spruce, and in value exceeded it by 40 per cent. Spruce, and
especially pulpwood, forms an ever increasing item in cut and export,
export of pulpwood having increased sevenfold in the last decade, to
nearly $2 million, and of woodpulp to over $4 million.
A notable economic improvement has taken place during the last ten or
fifteen years in that the proportion of raw materials exported,
especially logs and square timber, has decreased in favor of
manufactures.
While originally the home country took the bulk of exports of forest
products, the cut of Ontario has been always, duty or no duty, sent
almost entirely to the United States. In the last six or eight years,
the export to the United States has been doubled, amounting now to about
half of the total export, and as the States return of its own forest
products largely in the form of manufactures to the extent of about 6
million dollars worth, a balance of trade for the Canadian forest
product of 12 million dollars is left.