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Show TIMBER RESOURCES Of THE IDAHO FOREST According to the latest estimate, thp Idaho forest, with headquarters at McCall, Ida., has over six billion Ycet of merchantable timber as much an any other tbree forests in the local forest district. Its unbroken mountain moun-tain wilderness twice the. size of the state of Rhode Island is walled In by deep gorges of the Salmon river, south and middle forks and Big creek. Iong valley and Meadown vaIIpv, eight and two and a half miles in width, respectively, are tbe only populated popu-lated regions in the vicinity. About a thousand cattle and horses from Meadows valley are grazed on the forest, and a hundred thousand sheep, which are trailed each year from their winter ranges a hundred miles or mnn distant in southern Idaho. Four teen townships have from flO to LQQ million feet of timber, 11 have from 100 to 200 million, and one township has an estimated stand of 228 mil lion. Tie Butiness Brisk. The fall of snow at McCall this winter was only 26 inches, with a corresponding decrease overthe en-ttm en-ttm fore6t as compared with an average aver-age of 5 feet in previous years. In consequence an open season permitted permit-ted logging operations to be carried on all winter. From November to March, inclusive. Supervisor Graff re-i re-i ports sales of saw timber aggregating aggregat-ing 2,441,767 board feet, and 23,626 ties, and the cutting from private and state land is much heavier on account ac-count of greater accessibility. The Oregon Short Line pays 48 cents apiece for both sawed and hewed fir and larch ties delivered beside the track at McCall (Lakeport). foo Brothers are producing both sawed and hewed ties, and the Hoff & Brown mill sawed ties. On part cf the Ioe sale area the hewed ties are cut out first by contract, 18 cents per tie. including the piling or lopping and scattering of brush; farther from the mill setting ties are not only hewed from the smaller trees but also split from larger ones, to aoid hauling haul-ing the logs to the mill. In the case of the tie-splitting operations much fuel wood and even material that would make fence posts is left in the woods, since there is little local d-j d-j mand for firewood and it would not pay to ship by rail. Nearly as much I material would be lost under present ! market conditions, however, If the j logs were hauled to the mill and ! sawed. Slabs from the Hoff & Brown mill are used by the engine of the new electric light plant installed in McCall the first of the vear The Finlander tie cutters like to work in pairs, and two of these, in a two weeks' job cut 500. as many as 4S in a day. but only an average of 2Ci for the entire period. Their income was therefore $4.32 each for the best, or $2 34 for the average, day Thpy stated that their provisions cost them 34 centa a day American tie cutters from the southern states like best to split ties. Theyr work singly, and one person has cut as many as 40 or 45 ties in a single day. Idaho forest timber accessible under un-der present demand and transportation transporta-tion facilities is mainly in the yellow pine type, below 5500 feet altitude Pine and fir logs average about 6 to tbe thousand board feet, although many run 3 1-2 and 4 feet in diameter. An 18-foot log of dead timber 56 inches inch-es at the tip and 64 at the butt, and scaling 2640 board feet, is on exhibi tion near the McCall post office, having hav-ing been hauled on a sled by R L. Wilson and Merlin Agee for firewood The lumber from two such logs of green timber w'ould build a cortace According to the annual rings on tbe butt pnd, the tree from which it was taken was 2 feet in diameter whn inn vears old; 2 feet, 10 inches at 136; 3 feet, 7 1-2 Inches at 2on. 4 feet 1 inch at 250. 4 feet. 5 1-2 Inch-en Inch-en at 300; 4 feet. 7 inches at 350, and 5 feet nt 400. The outside circle of 2 inches prew so slowly that the fine rings, indistinct in the dead Bapwood, could not easily be counted Lake Aids Lumbering The Hoff & Brown mill, in McCall. and the Friar mill on tin west bhore use the lake in transporting and storing stor-ing logs Carl Brown, of the formor mill, estimate the cost of transport ing log? on the lake at 1 cent pi r thousand per mile, as compared with $1 per thousand on snow roads, and $1.50 per thousand on trucks on fair roads Wednesday afternoon William Minks brought a raft of 45,000 board leet of logs from a boom a mile and a half north on the east side of the lake with a boat equipped with a motor mo-tor of 1 1-2 horsepower. He was from lli to 6:30 In traveling the distance. Logs stored in a. boom or log pond do not deteriorate iu Cie years whereas a second season on the ground practically ruins them A billion feet ot excellent lodgepoh pinp. especially suited for treated tit s could be reached by construction ot an electric road forty miles under1 average mountain conditions. Water I over could be developed along the E route in abundance, additional ion- t hage -1 ured from the zinc and othr W J mines in the resort region, and tour- ,: ists earried in the summer. The ti " would make a trainload a day l. r . twenty-five years. |