Southern Appalachian Digital Collections

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Nature Magazine: Carolina number

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  • 326 NATURE MAGAZINE FOR MAY 193 I --, - ..' -JSAfc HAMBIR O IN THE PISGAH NATIONAL FOREST Recreation, constructive forestry and protection of watersheds are elements in this preserve this species is restricted to a comparatively small area chiefly in the southeastern corner. The turpentine industry which began nearly two hundred years ago and which reached its peak of production about the time of the Civil War was the ptimary cause of this desttuction. The boxing, followed by frequent fires, caused the trees, for which a profitable lumber market had not been established, to burn down, while droves of hogs fattened on the pine seeds and seedlings, preventing reproduction. Since the razor back hog has been eliminated through the enactment of the stock law there is still a fair possibility of the tree recapturing some of its lost acres; but most of this section has returned to forest growth, if at all, from the seed scattered by the tall loblolly pines which thrive along all the smaller streams. Scattered through the coastland, but of greater importance around Albemarle Sound and extending up through the Dismal Swamp into Virginia, were once forests of white cedar, known locally as "juniper." George Washington in his woodsman days carried on lumbering operations in these "juniper" tracts. Alas! fire following lumbering has largely prevented their regeneration, while the remnants of the timber are now being converted into ice-cream churns and butter tubs. About the only uncut forests are those occupying extensive swamps and containing black gum, tupelo gum and sweet gum timber. There has been little demand for this material so far except for veneer packages and to some extent for factory flooring. With the development of methods of using gum in the manufacture of paper, the Carolinas will be able to furnish material for several pulp plants. The better quality lands of the Piedmont Region have gradually been cleared and used for the production of cotton and tobacco. The deep red gashes in the hillsides show too plainly where forests have been removed and agriculture practiced at the expense of the land. Many of these fields, especially in the belt where the Piedmont merges into the mountains, might have been handled more profitably in timber. The present woodland of this region forming parts of the farms is comparatively free from fire because surrounded by cultivated land. But whether still in the original hardwoods and pine or whether grown up to second growth pine forests following abandonment, it has generally been cut with the idea of immediate profit rather than of permanent benefit to the forest. It was chiefly on account of the large proportion of oak timber in this region that the southern furniture industry was established fifty years ago at High Point. This business has now extended to many of the Piedmont towns, but strange to say it has found no foothold in the mountains or the Coastal Plain although much of the timber now being used by these factories comes from our mountain forests. The furniture industry in the Carolinas is now worth in excess of $50,000,000 per year, and though it continues to flourish the proportion of its wood derived from the Carolina forests is gradually decreasing. After the removal of the better quality of old growth timber from the Piedmont forests, the chief source of revenue from the farm woodlands has been the making of cross-ties. The development of the pulp industry, however, now promises to supplant this business as first in importance. The Southern Appalachian hardwood forests are the most varied of any hardwood regions in the temperate zone. Yellow poplar, ash, linden, hickory, buckeye, cucumber, cherry, walnut, sugar and red maple, nine species of oak, a large percentage of chestnut, and many other types of less importance are mixed in varied quantities throughout this region. Scattered sometimes in almost pure stands and again in individual occurrences are hemlocks, white pine and four species of yellow pines. At a large mill operated some years ago in the Great Smoky Mountains twenty-four diffetent varieties of trees were near Asheville
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Object’s are ‘parent’ level descriptions to ‘children’ items, (e.g. a book with pages).