Afforestation

“ Also worth consideration is the important matter of afforestation. There are now but some 3,000,000 acres of woods and plantations in this country, and many of these are badly managed, for forestry is almost an unknown art in the United Kingdom. ”

“ Inquiries regarding the afforestation of these strips of hillside showed that the extensive digging necessitated by the recovery of the roots usually caused new trees to spring up quickly as volunteers from scattered seed and from the roots, so that planting was not generally required. ”

“ All of these have provided a legal basis for developing nature and wetland reserves, protecting wild fauna and flora, conserving and managing water resources, conserving water and soil, preventing and controlling desertification, returning farmland and pastureland to woods and grassland, and protecting grassland ecology. In 2017, the regional government issued the Decision to Promote Greening by Tree-Planting and Afforestation, which proposed that every person should plant an average of five trees, and that all households and villages should take part in tree-planting. ”

“ The hill and mountain lands, wherever accessible to the densely peopled plains, have long been cut over and as regularly has afforestation been encouraged and deliberately secured even through the transplanting of nursery stock grown expressly for that purpose. We had read so much regarding the reckless destruction of forests in China and Japan and had seen so few old forest trees except where these had been protected about temples, graves or houses, that when Rev. ”

“ Under ordinary conditions, natural reforestation will maintain a satisfactory tree growth on lands where a practical system of forest protection is practiced. The complete removal of the forest is now accomplished only in fertile farming regions, where the agricultural value of the land is too high to permit it to remain longer in forest cover. Even in the Mississippi Valley and the Great Lakes belts there are still large areas of forest land. Most of the farms have woodlots which provide fuel, fencing, and some lumber. For the most part, these farm woodlots are abused. ”

“ It has to do with farm and forest, soil and climate, man and beast. It affects hill and valley, mountain and plain. It influences the life of cities, states, and nations. It deals not only with the manifold problems of growing timber and forest by-products, such as forage, naval stores, tanbark, and maple sugar, but it is intimately related to the navigability of rivers and harbors, the flow of streams, the erosion of hillsides, the destruction of fertile farm lands, the devastation wrought by floods, the game and birds of the forest, the public health, and national prosperity. ”

“ I usually succeeded in gathering them on the hundred per cent basis.
I am interested in this subject today because of an innate love of trees and because the development of a tree crop agriculture offers a way to stop soil erosion. To me the worst of all economic sins is the destruction of resources, and the worst of all resource destructions is the destruction of the soil, our one great and ultimate resource. "After man the desert" has been truly said too often of many old lands.
Soil cover is after all about the only thing that man has as a basis for the support of his life on earth. ”

“ For example, deforestation, by increasing run off, accelerates soil erosion and siltation of rivers and lakes. Air pollution and acidification play their part in killing forests and lakes. Such links mean that several different problems must be tackled simultaneously. And success in one area, such as forest protection, can improve chances of success in another area, such as soil conservation.
42. Second, environmental stresses and patterns of economic development are linked one to another. Thus agricultural policies may lie at the root of land, water, and forest degradation. ”

“ A system of forestry which will provide sufficient lumber for the needs of our country and keep our forest land productive must be built on the extension of our public forests. Our National Forests are, at present, the one bright feature of future lumbering. Their tree crops will never be cut faster than they can be grown. A balance between production and consumption will always be maintained. Our needs for more timber, the necessity for protecting the headwaters of streams, the demands for saving wild life, and the playground possibilities of our forests justify their extension. ”

“ Forests are crucial for maintaining and improving the productivity of agricultural land. Yet agricultural expansion, a growing world timber trade, and woodfuel demand have destroyed much forest cover. Although this destruction has occurred worldwide, today the greatest challenge is in developing countries, particularly in tropical forests. ”

“ In fact, about all these fields are good for is the growing of timber. Campaigns are now under way to increase tree planting and develop the production of lands adapted for forestry which previously have been idle.
The United States of the future will not be a desert, tree-less country. However, immediate measures to save our remaining trees must be developed. The greater part of our virgin timber has already been felled. The aftermath forests, which succeed the virgin stand, generally are inferior. Our supplies of ash, black walnut and hickory, once abundant, are now seriously limited. ”

“ But the greatest enemy of conservation is erosion, the best checks for erosion are roots.
Thus far, the only man who has been telling us anything about planting roots upon the hillsides is the forester. But he usually sets nothing but wood trees, which at the end of fifty or a hundred or a hundred and fifty years, we can cut down, and which, during the intervening time, have done nothing but cast shade, drop leaves and retain the soil. My doctrine is that the potentially greatest crop-producing plants are not those on which we now depend for our food, but are the trees ”

“ New England landowners are planting between 12,000,000 and 15,000,000 young forest trees a year. The Middle Atlantic and Central States are doing about as well. To save our forests, planting of this sort must be universal. It takes from fifty to one hundred years to grow a crop of merchantable timber. What the United States needs is a national forestry policy which will induce every landowner to plant and grow more trees on land that is not useful for farm crops. Our forestry problem is to put to work millions of acres of idle land. ”

“ Through reckless cutting, burning and pasturing by the small farmers it had become almost entirely denuded, natural reforestation being prevented by these practices combined with the dryness of the soil, intensified by the deforestation. ”

“ The National Forests aid greatly in conserving and making available for use the precious limited rainfall of the arid regions. That is why settlers in irrigated districts are deeply interested in the cutting of timber in the Federal woodlands. Destructive lumbering is never practiced in these forests. In its place has been substituted a system of management that assures the continued preservation of the forest-cover. Uncle Sam is paying special attention to the western water-sheds which supply reclamation and irrigation projects. ”

“ To insure a continuous supply of timber and help solve the problems of soil protection, water conservation and flood control, new forest reserves, communal forests and national parks have been established and barren watersheds reforested with economically valuable trees. ”

“ Much of this was cut-over and so severely burned before the creation of the forests that it bears no tree growth. Some of these lands will reseed themselves naturally while other areas have to be seeded or planted by hand. In this way the lands that will produce profitable trees are fitted to support forest cover. Because the soils and climate of our National Forests are different, special experiments have been carried on in different places to decide the best practices to follow. ”

“ They appreciate that it is necessary to protect and preserve the forest at the same time that profitable tree crops are being removed. They see the need for saving and increasing young growth and for protecting the woodlands against fire. If only these methods of forestry had been observed from the time the early settlers felled the first trees, not only would our forests be producing at present all the lumber we could use, but also the United States would be the greatest lumber-exporting country in the world. ”

“ A few States are still densely wooded, but in these the forces which have caused the disappearance of similar forests in other regions have now begun to assert themselves. Some will yield to their old enemy, the ravaging fire that could so often be prevented; others must ultimately recede to make way for agriculture; many will be removed more rapidly for the sake of their material. It is confidently to be expected, however, in view of the widening influence forestry is exerting, that where it is desirable a provision will be [Pg 99] made for a future growth to replace the present one. ”

“ The practice of forestry has, therefore, become an important part in the household economy of civilized nations. Every nation has learned, through the misuse of its forest resources, that forest destruction is followed by timber famines, floods, and erosion. ”

“ Now our great forests are largely depleted, and scientific deforestation has become an absolute necessity. One of the most important duties the States as well as the Nation have to perform is the transformation of this vast stumpage area into forests and farms. Practical and scientific reforestation should convert the lands unsuited for farming into forests, so that every acre would produce revenue and furnish some necessity of life. The dry season of 1910 has particularly emphasized another important duty in this connection, and that is the protection of our forests and settlers from fires. ”

“ The lumber industry of this country can aid reforestation by practicing better methods. It can harvest its annual crop of timber without injuring the future production of the forests. It can limit forest fires by leaving the woods in a safe condition after it has removed the timber. Some private timber owners who make a living out of cutting lumber, have even reached the stage where they are planting trees. They are coming to appreciate the need for replacing trees that they cut down, in order that new growth may develop to furnish future timber crops. ”

“ With regard to forest conservation as concerning the question of climate, I may quote the words of Mr. Firth, who, in a paper read before the Auckland Institute in 1874, remarks that: "Denudation of timber produces barrenness of soil, increases insect life, creates drought, diminishes rain, accelerates evaporation, causes floods and untimely frosts, lessens the production of food, diminishes population, and finally degrades a nation. The glory of many an ancient empire departed with its forests. ”

“ We are informed that the State could reforest to advantage from 2,000 to 2,500 acres a year, and could supply material for planting at least 30,000 acres a year on private land.
The importance of conservation by reforestation becomes apparent when one takes into consideration the relative rates of forest removal and forest reproduction. In the United States at large, we take from our forests each year, not counting the loss by fire, three times their yearly growth. We take 36 cubic feet per acre for each 12 cubic feet grown. ”

“ A wealthy and healthy rural environment depends on small farmers working efficiently and productively for themselves. Food security is not achieved through large-scale farming but through production diversity and storage of surpluses.
13.2.2 AGROFORESTRY
An answer to the agricultural problem in the LEM ecozone is Agroforestry, as we have already suggested above. Agroforestry is:
the maintenance and enhancement of soil conditions with the use of tree and shrub crops, and/or leguminous trees, shrub and herbaceous plants in order to maximise sustainable agricultural productivity. ”

“ Our efforts at increased production must be complemented by our reinvigorated drive for conservation. I believe an important expression of our maturity is our exercise of good stewardship over our resources.
I am pleased to report that we marked a milestone last year in our reforestation program. In 1989, we reversed the deforestation trend: we have now planted more areas with trees than the areas wasted by the irresponsible exploitation of our forest resources. ”

“ This is the complex in which vitality attains dominance over lower nature; and through it investigators are attaining control over the vital powers for the welfare of men and nations. Thus, the normal circulation is notably complete in woodlands, and is notably deranged by deforestation; when the trees are felled and not replaced by other cover transpiration ceases, the air dries so that seeds and seedlings may wither, and the soil-water level lowers; the duff is desiccated and wind-blown, leaving the previously porous soil to harden and bake ”

“ The effects of deforestation, of tree-planting on the prairies, of the irrigation and cultivation of the deserts, all mean the rapid shifting of faunal boundaries, the extension of ranges of some animals, restriction in the ranges of others, and, with no doubt whatever, the complete extermination of many others, as in a few cases already on record. ”

“ Yet the forests of America are still a great source of wealth even though the timber resources have been heavily drawn upon during the past hundred years. This is one of the natural resources which has been wastefully used and it is only in recent years that attention has been given to conserving what is left of it. The forests are needed, not only as a source of timber supply, but in order to preserve the fertility of the soil and to retain in it the moisture which is otherwise evaporated or run off. ”