Part 2 (1/2)
These and many other conditions of sale must be studied out in a form adapted to each particular case, and must be discussed with the men who propose to buy, who often have wise and practical suggestions to make.
Similar questions on a less important scale present themselves and must be answered in the matter of small timber sales, and of timber given without charge under free-use permits to settlers and others.
When the terms of a contract of sale have been worked out and accepted and the timber has been sold, then the Forest a.s.sistant has charge of the extremely interesting task of marking the trees that are to be cut, in accordance with these terms. Usually this is done by marking all the trees which are to be felled, but sometimes by marking only the trees which are to remain.
The marking is usually done by blazing each tree and stamping the letters ”U. S.” upon the blaze with a Government marking axe or hatchet.
It must be done in such a way that the loggers will have no excuse either for cutting an unmarked tree or leaving a marked tree uncut, or _vice versa_, as the case may be. The marking may be carried out by the Rangers and Forest Guards under supervision of the Forest a.s.sistant, or in difficult situations he may mark or direct the marking of each tree himself. Marking is fascinating work.
Later, while the logging is under way, the Forest Examiner will often inspect it to see that the terms of the sale are complied with, that the trees cut are thrown in places where they will not unduly damage either young growth or the larger trees which are to remain, and that the other conditions laid down for the logging in the contract of sale are observed. The scaling of the logs to determine the amount of payment to the Government will many times be under his supervision, although in the larger sales this work, as well as the routine inspection of the logging, is usually carried out by a special body of expert lumbermen, who often bring to it a much wider knowledge of the woods than the men in actual charge of the lumbering.
In nearly every National Forest there are areas upon which the trees have been destroyed by fire. Many of these are so large or so remote from seed-bearing trees that natural reproduction will not suffice to replace the forest. In such localities planting is needed, and for that purpose the Forest Examiner must establish and conduct a forest nursery.
The decision on the kind of trees to plant and on the methods of raising and planting them, the collection of the seed, the care and transplanting of the young trees until they are set out on the site of the future forest, forms a task of absorbing interest. Such work often requires a high degree of technical skill. It is likely to occupy a larger and larger share of the time and attention of the trained men of the Forest Service.
[Ill.u.s.tration: A FOREST EXAMINER RUNNING A COMPa.s.s LINE]
The Forest a.s.sistant's or Examiner's knowledge of surveying makes it natural for him to take an important part in the laying out of new roads and trails in the forest, or in correcting the lines of old ones, and there is little work more immediately useful. The forest can be safeguarded effectively just in proportion to the ease with which all parts of it can be reached. Forest protection may be less technically interesting than other parts of the Forester's work, but nothing that he does is more important or pays larger dividends in future results.
In addition to his studies of the habits and reproduction of the different trees for working plans or timber sales, or simply to increase his knowledge of the forest, the Forest Examiner is often called upon to lay out sample plots for ascertaining the exact relation of each species to light, heat, and moisture, or for studying its rate of growth. He may find it necessary to determine the effect of the grazing of cattle or sheep on young growth of various species and of various ages, or to ascertain their relative resistance to fire. In general, what time he can spare from more pressing duties is very fully occupied with adding to his silvical knowledge by observation, with studies of injurious insects or fungi, of the reasons for the increase or decrease of valuable or worthless species of trees in the forest, the innumerable secondary effects of forest fires, the causes of the local distribution of trees, or with some other of the thousand questions which give a never-failing interest to work in the woods.
The protection of a valuable kind of tree often depends upon the ability to find a use for, and therefore to remove, a less-valuable species which is crowding it out, for as yet the American Forester can do very little cutting or thinning that does not pay. Just so, the protection of a given tract against fire may depend upon the ability to use, and therefore to remove, a part or the whole of the dead and down timber which now makes it a fire trap. For such reasons as these, the uses of wood and the markets for its disposal form exceedingly important branches of study for the Forest Examiner, who will usually find that his duties require him to be thoroughly familiar with them.
It is more and more common to find each Forest Officer--Ranger, Forest Examiner, or Supervisor--combining in himself the qualities and the knowledge required to fill any or all of the other positions. The professionally trained man who develops marked executive ability is likely to become a Supervisor, just as a Ranger, with the necessary training and experience, who may wish to devote himself to silvical investigations may be transferred to that work. The point is that each man has individual opportunity to establish and occupy the place for which he is best fitted.
The success of the technical Forester, like that of the Ranger, and indeed of nearly every Government Forest Officer, in whatever position or line of work, will very frequently depend on his good judgment and practical sense, the chief ingredient of which will always be his knowledge of local needs and conditions, and his sympathetic understanding of the local point of view. This does not mean that the local point of view is always to control. On the contrary, the Forest Officer must often decide against it in the interest of the welfare of the larger public. But the desires and demands of the users of the forest should always be given the fullest hearing and the most careful consideration. To this rule there is no exception whatsoever.
PERSONAL EQUIPMENT
Forestry differs from most professions in this, that it requires as much vigor of body as it does vigor of mind. The sort of man to which it appeals, and which it seeks, is the man with high powers of observation, who does not shrink from responsibility, and whose mental vigor is balanced by physical strength and hardiness. The man who takes up forestry should be little interested in his own personal comfort, and should have and conserve endurance enough to stand severe physical work accompanied by mental labor equally exhausting.
Foresters are still few in numbers, and the point of view which they represent, while it is making immense strides in public acceptance, is still far from general application. Therefore, Foresters are still missionaries in a very real sense, and since they are so few, it is of the utmost importance that they should stand closely together.
Differences of opinion there must always be in all professions, but there is no other profession in which it is more important to keep these differences from working out into animosities or separations of any kind. We are fortunate above all in this, that American Foresters are united as probably the members of no other profession. This _esprit de corps_ has given them their greatest power of achievement, and any man who proposes to enter the profession should do so with this fact clearly in mind.
The high standard which the profession of forestry, new in the United States, has already reached, its great power for usefulness to the Nation, now and hereafter, and the large responsibilities which fall so quickly on the men who are trained to accept it--all these things give to the profession a position and dignity which it should be the first care of every man who enters it to maintain or increase.
To stand well at graduation is or ought to be far less the object of a Forester's training than to stand well ten or twenty years after graduation. It is of the first importance that the training should be thorough and complete.
A friend of mine, John Muir, says that the best advice he can give young men is: ”Take time to get rich.” His idea of getting rich is to fill his mind and spirit full with observations of the nature he so deeply loves and so well understands; so that in his mind it is not money which makes riches, but life in the open and the seeing eye.
Next to those basic traits of personal character, without which no man is worth his salt, the Forester's most important quality is the power of observation, the power to note and understand, or seek to understand, what he sees in the forest. It is just as essential a part of the Forester's equipment to be able to see what is wrong with a piece of forest, and what is required for its improvement, as it is necessary for a physician to be able to diagnose a disease and to prescribe the remedy.
Silvics, which may be said to be the knowledge of how trees behave in health and disease toward each other, and toward light, heat, moisture, and the soil, is the foundation of forestry and the Forester's first task is to bring himself to a high point of efficiency in observing and interpreting these facts of the forest, and to keep himself there. It should be as hard work to walk through the forest, and see what is there to be seen, as to wrestle with the most difficult problem of mathematics. No man can be a good Forester without that quality of observation and understanding which the French call ”the forester's eye.” It is not the only quality required for success in forestry, but it is unquestionably the first.
Perhaps the second among the qualities necessary for the Forester is common sense, which most often simply means a sympathetic understanding of the circ.u.mstances among which a man finds himself. The American Forester must know the United States and understand its people. Nothing which affects the welfare of his country should be indifferent to him.
Forestry is a form of practical statesmans.h.i.+p which touches the national life at so many points that no Forester can safely allow himself to remain ignorant of the needs and purposes of his fellow citizens, or to be out of touch with the current questions of the day. The best citizen makes the best Forester, and no man can make a good Forester unless he is a good citizen also.
The Forester can not succeed unless he understands the problems and point of view of his country, and that is the reason why Foresters from other lands were not brought into the United States in the early stages of the forest movement. At that time practically no American Foresters had yet been trained, and the great need of the situation was for men to do the immediately pressing work. Foresters from Germany, France, Switzerland, and other countries could have been obtained in abundant numbers and at reasonable salaries. They were not invited to come because, however well trained in technical forestry, they could not have understood the habits of thought of our people. Therefore, in too many cases, they would have failed to establish the kind of practical understanding which a Forester must have with the men who use, or work in, his forest, if he is to succeed. It was wiser to wait until Americans could be trained, for the practising Forester must handle men as well as trees.