Show What Uncle Sam is Doing for our j TONS OF SEED FOR NATIONAL D. July E U. S. Department of is using this year on lional forests over ten tons Most of this seed planted or rest will be utilized later f as favorable condi-isare to the takes a great many tree lis to make ten Jack t the most important tree for rating in the Nebraska sand Is by the Forest will Sage something like to Of Western yellow the tree most extensively throughout the National rests as a seed 1 make a Altogether tons of seed to be used represent perhaps Ion single every seed could be depended Jo produce a young tree suiter the result of nursery stock suf-gf to plant three hundred acres of but so jj n be looked for because seeds do not the seed will be g Broadcast or in seed with a in the place where the afe to Fen when nursery stock is f a liberal allowance must In the first V 5 COnsiderable percentage will be found to be Of those which germin-will bs jn 1 If from a of seed that i individual transplants C for t of Agriculture ned satisfactory Canal Frest ap now twenty-four nUrseries with an CaPacity of over But there JL are many millions of old burns on the National Forest which are waiting to be and some quicker and cheaper method than the actual planting of nursery-grown trees is urgently Therefore the foresters are making experiments on a large scale with different methods of direct sowing and and most of the seed gathered last year was obtained for this How to Plant the Broadcasting has already been found to give good results in some It was first tried in the Black Hills of South with an encouraging To broadcast an acre of with yellow pine seed about 8 of seed is the most formidable drawbacks to this method is the extent to which the seed may be consumed by birds and If the season happens to be one in which food for these animals is the is very The problem of control of animal such as field ground and which eat the tree and also the further problem of preventing the depredations of which are altogether toe fond of little trees whether nursery transplants or field-grown is receiving the attention of the Biological Survey experts of the Department of How the Seed is In some localities the Department has had to purchase but most of that used is gathered by Forest Service men The cost of gathering has varied for the different regions from thirty-five cents to one dollar a As a rule the seed is collected in the fall when most conifers ripen their Parties of three or four men ordinarily wor Where lumbering is in progress the collectors follow the sawyers take the cones directly from the felled In standing the task is much more The men must often climb tall pines and pull the cones from the branches as best they There these are on the extremities and beyond the reach of the pruning sheers are The cones are dropped to the ground and then gathered into buckets and transferred to in which they are carried to a central point if further The extraction of the seeds is tedious rather than In some cases the cones are spread out upon sheets in the when after a they open and the seed drop in other cases it is necessary to resort to This is applied by placing the cones upon trays with screen bottoms and the temperature of the room to the proper The cones the winged seeds fall and the seed is separated finally from wings and dirt by a fanning A good many seeds have been removed from the cone by but this is a sore trial to the fingers of the pickers and an exceedingly slow |