Excerpt from Annual Report, 1955: Southeastern Forest Experiment Station, Asheville, North Carolina

The trend in timber supply is toward more hardwood and less pine. Since 1945, hardwood sawtimber has increased 9 percent in volume, while softwood sawtimber has decreased nearly 4 percent. The scarcity and costof quality lumber in local yards has brought the softwood decline home to many citizens. Softwood now makes up only 55 percent of the total sawtimber volume compared to 58 percent in 1945. The volume of all hardwood growing stock (trees 5 inches d.b.h. And over) has increased nearly 14 percent, but softwood has remained about the same. Utilization of cull hardwood trees has not kept pace with the annual volume increase, and the southeastern forests now contain nearly 150 million cords of low-quality hardwood.

Net annual growth is greater than at the time of the 1945 Reappraisal; 10 percent more in the case of softwood sawtimber, and 20 percent more in the case of hardwood. In 1952, softwood sawtimber growth exceeded cut by 17 percent, whereas hardwood growth exceeded cut by 51 percent. Growth of softwood growing stock exceeded cut by 12 percent; hardwood by 77 per cent. This favorable growth-cut relationship for growing stock is particularly significant in the face of a timber cut 6 percent greater in 1952 than in 1944.

Forest productivity is reduced by a number of destructive agents, principally fire, insects, and disease. Total mortality in 1952 was 626 million board-feet, or about 5 percent of net sawtimber growth. Great progress has been made in fire prevention and control, but fire is still an ever-present menace. This was amply demonstrated in the spring of 1955 when a single fire burned over acres. Eighty-six percent of the forest land is protected from fire but there are still over 13 million acres unprotected. Over half of this acreage is in Florida. Also, much improve ment needs to be made in the control of insects and disease in the Southeast.

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