In the northeastern States it is the custom to have connected with
the farm apiece of virgin woodland, commonly called the wood lot. Its
object primarily is to supply the farmer with the firewood, fence
material, and such dimension timbers as he may need from time to time
for repairs on buildings, wagons, etc.
As a rule, the wood lot occupies, as it ought to, the poorer part of
the farm, the rocky or stony, the dry or the wet portions, which are
not well fitted for agricultural crops. As a rule, it is treated as
it ought not to be, if the intention is to have it serve its purpose
continuously; it is cut and culled without regard to its reproduction.
As far as firewood supplies go, the careful farmer will first use
the dead and dying trees, broken limbs, and leavings, which is quite
proper. The careless man avoids the extra labor which such material
requires, and takes whatever splits best, no matter whether the
material could be used for better purposes or not.
When it comes to the cutting of other material, fence rails, posts, or
dimension timber, the general rule is to go into the lot and select
the best trees of the best kind for the purpose. This looks at first
sight like the natural, most practical way of doing. It is the method
which the lumberman pursues when he "culls" the forest, and is, from
his point of view perhaps, justifiable, for he only desires to secure
at once what is most profitable in the forest. But for the farmer, who
proposes to use his wood lot continuously for supplies of this kind, it
is a method detrimental to his object, and in time it leaves him with a
lot of poor, useless timber which encumbers the ground and prevents the
growth of a better crop.
Our woods are mostly composed of many species of trees; they are mixed
woods. Some of the species are valuable for some special purposes,
others are applicable to a variety of purposes, and again others
furnish but poor material for anything but firewood, and even for that
use they may not be of the best.
Among the most valuable in the northeastern woods we should mention
the white pine--king of all--the white ash, white and chestnut oak,
hickories, tulip tree, black walnut, and black cherry, the last three
being now nearly exhausted; next, spruce and hemlock, red pine, sugar
maple, chestnut, various oaks of the black or red oak tribe, several
species of ash and birch, black locust; lastly, elms and soft maples,
basswood, poplars, and sycamore.
Now, by the common practice of culling the best it is evident that
gradually all the best trees of the best kinds are taken out, leaving
only inferior trees or inferior kinds--the weeds among trees, if one
may call them such--and thus the wood lot becomes well-nigh useless.
It does not supply that for which it was intended; the soil, which was
of little use for anything but a timber crop before, is still further
deteriorated under this treatment, and being compacted by the constant
running of cattle, the starting of a crop of seedlings is made nearly
impossible. It would not pay to turn it into tillage ground or pasture;
the farm has by so much lost in value. In other words, instead of using
the interest on his capital, interest and capital have been used up
together; the goose that laid the golden egg has been killed.
This is not necessary if only a little system is brought into the
management of the wood lot and the smallest care is taken to avoid
deterioration and secure reproduction.