A Brief History of Forestry.: In Europe, the United States and Other CountriesFernow, B. E. (Bernhard Eduard)
History
A Brief History of Forestry.: In Europe, the United States and Other Countries
Fernow, B. E. (Bernhard Eduard)
Forests and forestry -- History
A separate branch of the forest service carried on the work of surveying
and mapping the forest area instead of the regular Survey of India, with
the result of cheapening the cost. Some 74,000 square miles had been
mapped on the scale of 4 inch to the mile, the standard, some smaller
areas on smaller scale, at the rate of $25 per square mile. In 1908,
however, this work was handed over to the Survey.
_Silviculture._ Silvicultural practices are naturally but little
developed. Protection against fire, grazing, overcutting has been the
first requisite. The unregulated selection system with a diameter limit,
which Brandis introduced, still prevails mostly, although beginnings of
a compartment and group system in converting miscarried selection forest
of Deodar, Pine and Sal have been made, or rather of an improved
selection method, which seeks to secure reproduction in groups.
Clearcutting with seed trees held over is practised in the coniferous
mountain forest. Coppice and coppice with standards (reserves of
sprouts) is a natural condition over large areas, especially with Teak
and Sal. Even improvement cuttings or sowing on barren hillsides with
remarkable success, are not absent.
The attempts at securing reproduction, especially in the truly tropic
forests have often miscarried, inferior species filling the openings.
Girdling of inferior species to favor the better classes has hardly had
the desired result. In the deciduous forest, the same difficulty of
undesirable aftergrowth is experienced, deteriorating the composition,
except in the case of the gregarious Sal tree (_Shorea robusta_), the
treatment of which for reproduction has, after many failures, been well
established. Other gregarious species also can be satisfactorily
reproduced. The culled and burned-over forests, of which, there are
many, are re-habilitated in a manner by merely removing the old
overmature and defective timber, with comparative success.
In some parts, the large gregarious bamboos are a serious obstacle to
reproduction. Here, the only chance for reproduction exists when they
flower and die. Killing the bamboos by cutting the annual shoots proved
a failure, but burning over the whole area and sowing seems to be
followed by success.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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