B. E. Fernow

“ For the student of forestry the history of its development in Germany is of greatest interest not only because his art has reached here the highest and most intensive application, but because all the phases of development through which other countries have passed or else will eventually have to pass are here exemplified, and many if not most of the other countries of the world have more or less followed German example or have been at least influenced by German precedent. There is hardly a policy or practice that has not at some time in some part been employed in the fatherland of forestry. ”

“ Only when a reduction in the natural supplies of forest products under the demands of civilization, necessitates a husbanding of supplies or necessitates the application of art or skill or knowledge in securing a reproduction, or when unfavorable conditions of soil or climate induced by forest destruction make themselves felt does the art of forestry make its appearance. ”

“ With the irregular distribution of forests, the peculiarities of Indian government affairs and population, and the wild and difficult forest conditions themselves, it is but natural that the work thus far has been chiefly one of organization, survey, and protection.
In the protection against unlawful felling or timber stealing and grazing, the Government of India has shown itself fully equal to the occasion by a liberal policy of supplying villagers in proximity of the forests with fuel, building material, pasture, etc., at reduced prices or gratis. ”

“ If there be one philosophy more readily derivable than another from the study of the history of forestry it is that history repeats itself. The same policies and the same methods which we hear propounded to-day have at some other time been propounded and tried elsewhere: we can study the results, broadening our judgment and thereby avoid the mistakes of others. ”

“ Nowhere is the record of experience and the historic method of study of more value than in an empiric art like forestry, in which it takes decades, a lifetime, nay a century to see the final effects of operations. ”

“ The interest which we have in the development of forestry in this small territory, of somewhat less than 16,000 square miles with over three million people, lies in the fact that it is a republic, or rather an aggregation of republics, the oldest in existence, and that, occupying an Alpine mountain country, it has developed a unique co-operative policy of forest protection. Being largely German by origin and sentiment, German influence on the development of forestry methods, outside of the administrative measures, has here been as strong as in Austria. ”

“ At the head of affairs stood the so-called cameralists or chamber officials, men who had prepared themselves by the study of philosophy, law, diplomacy and political economy for the positions of directors of finance and State administration. Rather ignorant of natural science, and without practical forestry knowledge, their efforts were not always well directed. They deserve credit, however, for having collected into encyclopædic volumes the empiric knowledge of the practitioners or Holzgerechten, and for having elaborated it more or less successfully. ”

“ Each State being under the Constitution sovereign in itself as far as its internal administration is concerned, it is evident that no uniformity of policies can be expected, except so far as imitativeness, in which the American citizen excels, may lead State after State to repeat the experiment attempted by one. The federal government has no direct jurisdiction in matters concerning the management of resources within the States, except so far as it still owns lands in the Western, so-called Public Land States, and a few parcels in the Eastern States over which it still retains jurisdiction. ”

“ Again, we find that more than a century ago fear [3] of a timber famine agitated not only the dense populations of many European countries, but even the scanty population of the United States, in spite of the natural forest wealth which is still supplying us; and not without good reason, for at that time wood was the only fuel and rivers the only means of transportation; hence local scarcity was to be feared and was not unfrequently experienced when accessible forest areas had been exploited. Railroad and canal development and the use of coal for fuel changed this condition on both continents. ”

“ Indeed, while ample legislation has been enacted, the people, overburdened with debt, and needing the small income that can be derived from pasturing or renting the pasture in the woods, make it difficult to carry on any reform, and the enforcement of the laws has again and again led to serious trouble. “Forestry is a sore point in the national economy of Italy, as it involves sacrifice of money and time.” Italy, therefore, is still in the transition period from forestal rapine to forest culture. ”

“ As agriculture develops, the need for farming ground overshadows the usefulness of the forest in all these directions, and it is cleared away; moreover, [9] as population remains scanty, a wasteful use of its stores forms the rule, until necessity arises for greater care in the exploitation, for more rational distribution of farm and forest area, and finally for intentional reproduction of wood as a useful crop. ”

“ By general law, the State has the right to surveillance of private property, although the extent of this right is not fully defined. The government may take for its own use, by paying for it, upwards of one-sixth of the annual cut; it collects a tax of 12 to 18 per cent. for all woodwork cut; it forbids the pasturing of woods that have been burned within 10 years, and obliges all owners of over 1200 acres to employ forest guards. This and other interference with property rights naturally acts as deterrent to private forest management. ”

“ The white man, to be sure, is a more lavish wood consumer; his farms increased more rapidly, his buildings and his fireplaces consumed more forest growth, and carelessness with fire was, as it is still, his besetting sin. Moreover, a trade in timber with the Old World developed, in which only the best and largest-sized material figured. Wastefulness was bred in him by the sight of plenty, and the hard work of clearing his farm acres incited a natural enmity to the encumbering forest. ”

“ Western States, in which the public lands are situated, has been able to change its land policy from that of liberal disposal to one of reservation, it alone cannot save the situation. While a few of the States have made beginnings in working out a policy to arrest the destruction of their forest resources, which are mostly in private hands, still much water must flow down the Mississippi before adequate measures will be taken to stave off the threatening timber famine, and the energy of the various local and national Conservation associations will need to be exercised to the utmost. ”

“ The value of studying the historical development of an economic subject or of a technical art which, like forestry, relies to a large extent upon empiricism, lies in the fact that it brings before us, in proper perspective, accumulated experience, and enables us to analyze cause and effect, whereby we may learn to appreciate the reasons for present conditions and the possibilities for rational advancement. ”

“ At the present time we find all the European nations practicing forestry, although with a very varying degree of intensity. The greatest and most universal development of the art is for good reasons to be found in Germany and its nearest neighbors. Early attention to forest conservancy was here induced by density of population, which enforces intensity in the use of soil, and by the comparative difficulty of securing wood supplies cheaply enough from outside. ”

“ If we assume a log timber requirement by the 500 million people of 6000 million cubic feet and could secure what France annually produces, namely a little less than 9 cubic feet of such timber per acre, the area supposed to be under forest would amply suffice. But a large part of it is in fact withdrawn from useful production and of the balance not more than 250 million acres at best are as yet under management for continuous production. Hence attention to forestry is an urgent necessity for every industrial nation. ”

“ Only gradually, by partition, immigration and uneven numerical development, was the original Mark or differentiation into family associations destroyed and a more heterogeneous association of neighbors substituted. At the same time, inequality of ownership arose especially from the fact that those who owned a larger number of slaves (the conquered race) had the advantage in being able to clear and cultivate more readily new and rough forest ground. Those without slaves would seek assistance from those more favored, exchanging for rent or service their rights to the use of land ”

“ Frequent change of administration, or at least the threat of such change, impedes consistent execution of plans; fickle public opinion may subvert at any time well laid plans which take time in maturing; [459] the true democratic doctrine of restricting State activity to police functions, and the doctrine of non-interference with private rights, as well as the idea of State rights in opposition to federal power and authority—all these characteristics of a democratic government are impediments to a concerted action and stable policy. ”

“ Their people, if not in race, are in temper and characteristics, and in their political economy more or less alike. They represent the oldest civilization in Europe, and in their long history have been frequently in collision with each other. Their forests, through centuries of abuse, are wherever accessible, in poorest condition. Long-continued political disturbances, which have prevented peaceful development, and poverty, have been the greatest hindrances to economic reforms like the recuperation of forests, which require sacrifices. ”

“ The severest test of democratic institutions is experienced when the attempt is made to establish a policy which shall guard the interests of the future at the expense of the demands and needs of the present. Democracy produces attitudes and characteristics of the people which are inimical to stable economic arrangements looking to the future, such as are implied in a forest policy. The vast country with an unevenly distributed and heterogeneous population presents the greatest variety of natural, as well as of economic conditions ”

“ The origin and growth of the art, then, is dependent on economic and cultural conditions, on various economic development and on elements of environment. The development of the art can only be understood and appreciated through the knowledge of such environment, of such other developments as of agriculture, of industries, of means of transportation, of civilization generally. ”

“ Again, the still poorly settled and originally heavily timbered countries of the Scandinavian peninsula and the vast empire of Russia are still heavy exploiters of forest products and are only just beginning to feel the drain on their forest resources; while the United States, with as much forest wealth as Russia, but with a much more intensive industrial development, has managed to reach the stage of need for a conservative forest policy in a shorter time. ”

“ First hardly recognized as of value or even as [6] personal property, the forest appears an undesirable encumbrance of the soil, and the attitude of the settler is of necessity inimical to the forest: the need for farm and pasture leads to forest destruction.
The next stage is that of restriction in forest use and protection against cattle and fire, the stage of conservative lumbering. Then come positive efforts to secure re-growth by fostering natural regeneration or by artificial planting: the practice of silviculture begins. ”

“ It is a remarkable fact that the nation which can boast of the most extensive forest department in one of her colonies, has at home not yet been able to come to an intelligent conception even, not to speak of application, of proper forest policy or forest economy. ”

“ The management of even the State forests can only be very extensive. The State still sells mostly stumpage, rarely cutting on its own account. The lumbering is carried on very much as in the United States by logging contractors, and the river driving is done systematically by booming companies. Selection forest is still the general practice, now often improved into group system, although a clear cutting system with planting has been practised, but is supposed to be less desirable, probably because it entails a direct money outlay or else because it was not properly done. ”