CHAPTER XXVII.
FORESTS, AND LUMBERING.
In Oregon, the forests are found almost exclusively on the mountains. Along the margins of streams there is usually a belt of timber a quarter of a mile in breadth. On the Columbia, this belt, even on the low grounds, is wider; but as there is a range of highlands of considerable elevation extending from the mouth of this river to and beyond its passage through the Cascade Mountains, with only occasional depressions, there is a great body of timber within reach of tide-water.
The base of the Coast Mountains on the west comes within two to six miles of the sea, and frequent spurs reach quite to the beach, forming high promontories. From the coast to the eastern base of the Coast Mountains, is a distance of from twenty to thirty miles. Allowing for the margin of level land toward the sea, and for openings among the foot-hills on the eastern side, here is an immense bod}^ of forest lands extending the whole length of the State, from north to south.
Again, the Cascade Range has a base from east to west of about forty miles, including the foot-hills. All the western side of this range is densely wooded, making another great supply of timber. The eastern side, having an entirely different climate, does not support the same heavy growth of trees.
Those forests furnish a most interesting study to the botanist. Beginning our observations on the coast, we find that near the sea we have, for the characteristic tree, the black spruce (A. Menziesii). It grows to a diameter of eight feet, and to a considerable height, though not the tallest of the spruces. Its branches commence about thirty feet from the ground, growing densely; while its leaves, unlike the other species, grow all round the twig. The foliage is a dark-green, with a bluish cast. The bark is reddish, and scaly; and the cones, which grow near the ends of the branches, are about two inches in length, and purplish in color. In appearance, it resembles the Norway spruce. It loves a moist climate and soil; growing on brackish marshes, and inundated islands
The Oregon cedar (Thuya Gigantea) grows very abundantly near the coast. This tree attains to a very great size, being often from twelve to fifteen feet in diameter; but is not so high as the spruce. The branches commence about twenty feet from the ground. Above this the wood is exceedingly knotty; but the lumber obtained from the clear portion of the trunk is highly valued for finishing work, in buildings, as it is light and soft, and does not shrink or swell like spruce lumber. For shingles and rails it is also valuable, from its durability.
The Indians make canoes of the cedar, nearly as light and elegant as the famous birch canoes of more northern tribes. Formerly they built houses of planks split out of cedar, with no better instrument than a stone axe and wedge. An axeman can split enough in two or three days to build himself a cabin. This tree is nearly allied to the arbor vitæ, which it resembles in foliage, having its leaves in flat sprays, that look as if they had been pressed. On the under side of the spray is a cluster of small cones. The bark is thin, and peels off in long strips, which are used by the Indians to make matting, and a kind of cloth used for mantles to shed the rain. It is also used by them to roof their houses, make baskets, etc. Altogether, it is the most useful tree of the forest to the native.
Hemlock spruce (Abies Canadensis) is next in abundance near the coast. It grows much taller than the cedar, often to one hundred and fifty feet, and has a diameter of from six to eight feet. The color is lighter, and the foliage finer, than that which grows in the Atlantic States; and the appearance of the tree is very graceful and beautiful.
Another tree common to the coast is the Oregon yew (Taxus Brevifolia). It is not very abundant; grows to a height of thirty feet, and flourishes best in damp woods and marshy situations. The wood is very tough, and used by the Indians for arrows. When much exposed to the sun, in open places, the foliage takes on a faded, reddish appearance. It bears a small, sweet, coral-red berry, of which the birds are very fond.
A few trees of the red fir (Abies Douglassii) occur in the Coast Mountains, but are not common; also, an occasional white spruce (Abies Taxifolia), and north of the Columbia small groves of a scrub pine (P. Contorta) appear on sandy prairies near the sea-beach. It grows only about forty feet high, and has a diameter of two feet.
Of the broad-leaved, deciduous trees, which grow near the coast, the white maple (Acer Macrophyllum) is the most beautiful and useful. It grows and decays rapidly—the mature tree attaining to the height of eighty feet, and a diameter of six feet; then decaying from the centre outward, lets its branches die and fall off, while from the root other new trunks spring up, and attain a considerable size in four or five years. The wood has a beautiful grain, and is valuable for cabinet manufactures, taking a high polish. The foliage is handsome, being very broad, and of a light green. In the spring long racimes of yellow flowers give the tree a beautiful and ornamental appearance, which makes it sought for as a shade tree.
The Oregon alder (Alnus Oregona) is another cabinet-wood of considerable value. The tree grows to a height of sixty feet, with a diameter of two or three feet. It has a whitish-gray bark, and foliage much resembling the elm. On short stems, near the ends of the branches, are clusters of very small cones, not more than an inch in length. When grown in open places, with sufficient moisture, it is a graceful and beautiful tree.
Two species of poplar are found near the coast—the cottonwood (Populus Monilifera) and the balsam-tree (or P. Augustifolia). They are found on the borders of streams, and by the side of ponds or springs; but not so abundant near the coast as east of the Coast Mountains.
Along the banks of creeks and rivers grows one kind of willow (Salix Scouleriana), about thirty feet in height, and not more than a foot in diameter, with broad, oval leaves; of very little value.
The vine maple (A. Circinatum) is more a shrub than a tree, seldom growing more than six to twelve inches thick near the ground; and not more than twelve to twenty, rarely thirty feet in height. It grows in prostrate thickets, in shaded places, twining back and forth, and in every direction. The wood being very tough, it is almost impossible to get through them; and they form one of the most serious obstructions to surveying, or hunting, in the mountains. The leaf is parted in seven dentated points, and is of a light green. These bushes make a handsome thicket at any time from early spring to late autumn—being ornamented with small red flowers in spring, and with brilliant scarlet leaves in autumn.
Another shrubby tree, which makes dense thickets in low or overflowed lands, is the Oregon crab-apple (Pirus Rivularis). This really pretty tree grows in groves of twenty feet in height, and so closely as with its tough, thorny branches to form impenetrable barriers against any but the smaller animals of the forest. The fruit is small and good-flavored, growing in clusters. The tree is a good one to graft upon, being hardy and fine-grained.
Another tree used to graft on is the wild cherry (Cerasus Mollis), which closely resembles the cultivated kinds, except in its small and bitter fruit. In open places it becomes a branching, handsome shade tree, but in damp ravines sometimes shoots up seventy feet high, having its foliage all near the top.
When we undertake to pierce the woods of the Coast Mountains, we find, in the first place, the ground covered as thickly as they can stand with trees from three to fourteen feet in diameter; and from seventy to three hundred feet in height. Wherever there is room made by decay, or fire, or tempest, springs up another thicker growth, of which the most fortunately located will live, to the exclusion of the others. Every ravine, creek, margin, or springy piece of ground is densely covered with vine-maple, cottonwood, or crab-apple.
As if these were not enough for the soil to support, every interstice is filled up with shrubs: some tough and woody; others, of the vining and thorny description. Of shrubs, the sallal (Gaultheria Shallon) is most abundant. It varies greatly in height, growing seven or eight feet tall near the coast, and only two or three in the forest. The stem is reddish, the leaves glossy, green, and oval, and the flower pink. Its fruit is a berry of which the Indians are very fond, tasting much like summer apple. This shrub is an evergreen.
Three varieties of huckleberries belong to the same range—one an evergreen, having fruit and flowers at the same time. This is the Vaccinium Ovatum, with leaves like a myrtle, and a black, rather sweet berry. The second has a very slender stalk, small, deciduous leaves, and small acid berries, of a bright scarlet color. This is V. Ovalifolium. The third—V. Parvifolium—resembles more the huckleberry of the Eastern States, and bears a rather acid blueberry. In favored localities these are as fine as those varieties which grow in Massachusetts or Michigan. In addition to these is a kind of false huckleberry, bearing no fruit; and a species of barberry, resembling that found in New England.
Of gooseberries there are also three varieties, none of them producing very good fruit. They are Ribes Laxiflorum, Bracteosum, and Lacustre.
The salmon berry (Rubus Spectabilis) is abundant on high banks, and in openings in the forest. It resembles the yellow raspberry.
Of plants that creep on the ground there are several varieties, some of them remarkably pretty. Of wild roses, spirea, woodbine, mock-orange, thorn bushes, and other familiar shrubs, there are plenty.
The Devil's Walking-stick (Echinophanax horridum) is a shrub deserving of mention. It grows to the height of six feet, in a single, thorny, green stem, and bears at the top a bunch of broad leaves, resembling those of the white maple. When encountered in dark thickets it is sure to make itself felt, if not seen. Add to all that has gone before, great ferns—from two to fourteen feet in height, with tough stems, and roots far in the ground—and we have the earth pretty much covered from sun and light.
These are the productions, in general, of the most western forests of Oregon. When we try to penetrate such tropical jungles, we wonder that any animals of much size—like the elk, deer, bear, panther, and cougar—get through them. Nor do all these inhabit the thickest portions of the forest, but the elk, deer, and bear keep near the occasional small prairies which occur in the mountains, and about the edges of clearings among the foot-hills, except when driven by fear to hide in the dark recesses of the woods. In the fall of the year, when the acorn crop is good in the valley between the Coast and Cascade mountains, great numbers of the black bear are killed by the farmers who live near the mountains.
As this region just described is, so is the whole mountain system of Western Oregon and Washington. Along the eastern slope of the Coast Range, around Puget Sound, along the Columbia highlands above a point forty miles from its mouth, and on the western slope of the Cascades, the same luxuriance of growth prevails. Indeed, nearly all the trees enumerated—the black spruce and scrub pine are exceptions—belong equally to the more eastern region. And the same of the shrubs.
But in this more eastern portion grow some trees that will not flourish in the soil and climate of the coast. Of those the most important is the red fir (Abies Douglassii.) Very extensive forests of it inhabit the mountain-sides and Columbia River highlands. It grows to a great height, its branches commencing fifty feet from the ground. The bark is thick, and deeply furrowed; the leaves rather coarse, and the cone is distinguished from other species by having three-pointed bracts between the scales.
The red fir is more used for lumber than any other kind, though it is of a coarse grain and shrinks very much. It is tough and durable, if kept dry. It is a very resinous wood, from which cause large tracts of it are burnt off every year. Yet it keeps fire so badly in the coals, that there is little danger of the cinders carrying fire when buildings constructed of it are burned: it goes out before it alights.
The yellow fir (A. Grandis) is also a tree which does not like sea-air, and is very valuable for lumber. It is distinguishable at a distance by its superior height, often over three hundred feet, and by the short branches of the top, which give it a cylindrical shape. It is admirably adapted for masts and spars, being fine-grained, tough, and elastic. The best of lumber is made from this fir, and large quantities of it exported from the Columbia River. The bark of the yellow fir is smoother, not so deeply furrowed as the red, and the oval cone is destitute of bracts.
Of foliaceous trees not found on the coast, is the oak (Quercus Garryana), which does not attain a very great size, not growing more than fifty feet high, except in rich, alluvial lands, where they attain fine dimensions. Another and smaller scrub-oak (Quercus Kellogia) is common, and the wood is good for axe-helves, hoops, and similar uses. The wood of the larger variety is used for making staves, and the bark for tanning.
Of all the trees growing along water-courses, the Oregon ash (Fraxinus Oregona) is the most beautiful. In size, it compares closely with the white maple. Its foliage is of a light yellow-green, the leaves being a narrow oval. Like the maple, it has clusters of whitish-yellow flowers, which add greatly to its grace and delicacy of coloring. The wood is fine-grained, and is useful for manufacturing purposes
A little back from the river, yet quite near it, we find the Oregon dogwood (Cornus Nuttalii). It is a much handsomer tree than the dogwood of the Atlantic States, making, when in full flower and in favored situations, as fine a display of broad, silvery-white blossoms as the magnolia of the Southern States. As an ornamental tree, it can not be surpassed; having a fresh charm each season, from the white blossoms of spring, to the pink leaves of late summer, and the scarlet berries of autumn. Its ordinary height is thirty or forty feet, but, in moist ravines and thick woods, it stretches up toward the light until it is seventy feet high.
A poplar not found near the coast, is the American aspen (P. Tremuloides). Small groves of this beautiful tree are found about ponds on the high ground, especially where water stands through the rainy season, in hollows which arc dry in summer.
A very ornamental wild cherry, peculiar to Oregon—a species of choke-cherry—is found near water-courses. The flowers are arranged in cylindrical racimes, of the length of three or four inches, are white, and very fragrant. It flowers early in the spring, at the same time with the service-berry, when the woody thickets along the rivers are gleaming with their snowy sprays.
A broad-leafed evergreen is the arbutus (A. Menziesii), commonly called laurel, which is found in the forests of the middle region from Puget Sound, north of the Columbia, to California and Mexico. In Spanish countries it is known as the madrono-tree. The trunk is from one foot to four feet in thickness, and when old is generally twisted. The bark undergoes a change of color annually; the old, dark, mahogany-colored bark scaling off, as the new, bright, cinnamon-colored one replaces it. The leaves are a long oval, of a bright, rich green, and glossy. It flowers in the spring, and bears scarlet berries in autumn—resembling those of the mountain ash. Altogether, it is one of the handsomest of American trees.
On the slopes of the Cascade Mountains is found a beautiful tree—the western chinquapin—the flower and fruit resembling the chestnut. Though commonly only a shrub, it here attains a height of thirty feet. This tree is the Castanea chrysophylla of Douglas.
A very peculiar and ornamental shrub, is the holly-leaved barberry (Berberis aquifolium). It has rather a vining stalk, from two to eight feet high, with leaves shaped like holly leaves, but arranged in two rows, on stems of eight or ten inches in length. It is an evergreen, although it seems to cast off some of its foliage in the fall to renew it in the spring. While preparing to fall, the leaves take the most brilliant hues of any in the forest, and shine as if varnished. The fruit is a small cluster of very acid berries, of a dark, bluish purple, about the size of the wild grape, from which it takes its vulgar name of "Oregon grape." It is very generally removed into gardens for ornament.
In damp places away from the rivers, grows the rose-colored spirea (S. Douglassii), in close thickets; and is commonly known as hardhack. Near such swamps are others of wild roses of several varieties, all beautiful.
It is almost impossible to give the names of the numerous kinds of trees and shrubs which grow in close proximity in the forests of Oregon. Beginning at the river's brink, we have willows, from the red cornel, whose crimson stems are so beautiful, to the coarse, broad-leafed C. Pubescens, ash, cottonwood, and balsam-poplar. On the low ground, roses, crab-apple, buckthorn, wild cherry. A little higher, service-berry, wild cherry again, red-flowering currant, white spirea, mock-orange, honeysuckle, low blackberry, raspberry, dogwood, arbutus, barberry, snowberry, hazel, elder, and alder. Gradually mixing with these, as they leave the line of high-water, begin the various firs, which will not grow with their roots in water. As the forest increases in density, the flowering shrubs become more rare; re-appearing at the first opening.
It would be impossible to exaggerate the beauty of such masses of luxuriant and flowering shrubbery covering the shores of the streams. Even the great walls of basalt, which are frequently exposed along the Columbia, are so overgrown with minute ferns, and vivid-green mosses, and vines, as to be much more beautiful and picturesque than they are forbidding.
In Southern Oregon, the botany of the forest changes perceptibly, some species of the Columbia River disappearing, and others taking their place; the change being accounted for by the greater elevation of the country, and the superior dryness of the climate.
There are several pines common to this more southern region: the sugar pine (P. Lambertina), balsam fir (P. Grandis), and P. Contorta, or twisted pine. Besides these, the manzanita (Arctorstaphylos, Glauca) and Rhododendron maximus belong to the southern portion of the State.
The game natural to forests and mountains is more abundant also in the southern ranges; and, from the greater frequency of open or prairie spots in the mountains, much more easily hunted.
The eastern side of the Cascade Range is but thinly timbered, and that with the yellow pine (P. Ponderosa), which has a trunk from three to five feet thick, and attains an average height of a hundred feet. The foliage of this pine is scattering, coarse, and longer than that of the Eastern varieties. Few shrubs grow on this slope of the mountains; and the smooth, grassy terraces have more the appearance of cultivated parks than of natural forest. Along the streams of Eastern Oregon arc but few trees; generally the willow, alder, cottonwood, and birch.
Upon the greater elevations of the eastern slope, the western larch (Larix occidentalis) appears quite frequently. It is a large tree, tall and slender, with short branches, leaves long and slender, and foliage of a pale, bluish green, light and feathery.
More rarely occurs, in peculiar situations, the silver fir (Pinus amabilis), so called from the silvery appearance of the under side of the dark-green foliage. The cones grow erect near the summit of the tree, and are of a size of six inches by two and a half, of a dark-purple color, and rather smooth appearance. The mountain ash also occurs, at rare intervals, in the Cascade Mountains.
Possibly there are other trees and shrubs not mentioned here. Our intention has been to make the reader acquainted with the general features of an Oregon forest; and if we have not failed in our intention, a comparison of our notes with the trees which compose one will enable him to identify most of them. For their botanical classification, we are indebted to the botanist of the Railroad Exploring Expedition.
Washington Territory contains more large bodies of timber standing on level ground, than Oregon does. An immense extent of fir and cedar forest encircles the whole Sound, and borders all the rivers, besides that which is found on the foot-hills of the Cascade and Coast ranges. It is estimated that three-fourths of Western Washington is covered with forest, a large proportion of which is the finest timber in the world, for size and durability. It is nothing unusual to find a piece of several thousand acres of fir, averaging three and a half feet in diameter at the stump, and standing two hundred feet without a limb—the tops being seventy feet higher. Three hundred feet is not an extraordinary growth in Washington Territory.
It would be impossible, in speaking of the forests of Oregon and Washington, to pass in silence the subject of their commercial importance. It is estimated that the area of forest land in Oregon and Washington covers 65,000 square miles. Not all of this timber is accessible, nor all of it valuable for market, and yet the quantity is immense that is marketable. Puget Sound exports annually from 100,000,000 to 350,000,000 feet of lumber; the Columbia River, 20,000,000; and the mills along the Oregon coast, about 35,000,000.
The Portland mills manufacture jointly 7,600,000 feet per annum, which is all consumed by the home demand; besides large quantities of planking for streets, which is furnished by the St. Helen mill, on the Columbia River. The amount manufactured all over the country, for home consumption, can hardly be correctly estimated, yet must amount to 75,000,000 more. This seems an enormous sum total for a comparatively new country; and suggests the possibility of sometime exhausting even the great timber supply of Oregon and Washington. The amount manufactured by the mills of the Oregon and California Railroad, for the construction and equipment of that road, can hardly be estimated. One of their mills is capable of cutting 400,000 feet per week.
The kinds of timber adapted to lumbering purposes are known as the red, white, and yellow fir, cedar, hemlock, and, in some localities, pine and larch. The red fir constitutes the great bulk of common lumber; the yellow fir is used where strength and elasticity are required, as in spars of vessels, piles, wharves, bridges, and house-building; and cedar for foundations of houses, fence-posts, and inside finishing of houses.
The cabinet-woods are maple, alder, and arbutus. There is oak for staves, and other purposes; but nothing that answers for wagon-making grows on these mountains. Hemlock becomes valuable as furnishing bark for tanning leather. Ash is used for some mechanical purposes; and makes excellent fire-wood.
The red fir is very resinous, and might be made valuable for its pitch. The quality of Oregon turpentine is superior; but owing to the high freights and high rates of labor on this coast, has not heretofore proven profitable as an export. It is common to find a deposit of dried pitch or resin in the trunks of large firtrees—especially those that have grown on rocky soil—of one to two inches in thickness, either forming a layer quite round the heart of the tree, or extending for fifty feet up through the tree, in a square "stick."
Trees that have been destroyed by fire have their roots soaked full of black pitch or tar; and even the branches of growing trees drop little globules of clear, white pitch on the ground. This wood makes excellent charcoal; in the burning of which a great deal of tar might be saved, by providing for its being run off from the pit. There is also plenty of willow wood for making charcoal, growing on all the bottom-lands.
From the figures given, it will be seen that Washington Territory exports, at the lowest estimate, double the lumber of Oregon. Puget Sound has unrivaled facilities for that branch of business; and has not much of an agricultural population adjacent to it. Oregon, on the contrary, is chiefly agricultural, yet not without excellent facilities for the manufacture of lumber. It will take years of lumber-making along the Columbia, and the rivers and bays of the Coast Range, to clear even a mile of water-front in the vicinity of one mill. This is why fires are suffered to destroy so much fine timber every year: the farmers can not get the heavy growth off the land in any other way.
It follows, of course, that where the supply is so great the price is correspondingly small. At some country mills, run by water-power, lumber can be obtained for nine dollars per thousand feet. At Portland, where they are all run by steam, the prices range thus: Street planking, $11 to $12; common lumber, $14 to $15; siding, $20 to $21; flooring, $26 to $28; and miscellaneous dressed lumber, from $20 to $31. The Columbia River mills are not at so much expense in getting logs, and consequently sell at figures somewhat lower.
The cost of manufacturing lumber depends very much upon the location of the mills. Those that are situated on a navigable river, slough, or bay, near a fine tract of fir or cedar, or both, have greatly the advantage; and there are plenty such locations along the Lower Columbia. The St. Helen mill, for instance, gets logs rafted from Scappoose Bay, Lewis River, or the Columbia, from tracts of good timber from three to twelve miles distant. There are splendid bodies of cedar upon Lewis River; also, near the Columbia, two or three miles below St. Helen; and fir all around—on all the tributaries, and on the great river itself. The Rainier and Oak Point mills are in the midst of timber; and so of those on the coast.
The price of logs in the raft is from $3.50 to $5 per M., where it is necessary to purchase them. Labor is worth from $2 to $5 per day, according to the grade; all expenses estimated in gold coin. Timbered lands, conveniently located, are held at from $8 to $15 per acre; but there is plenty of Government land within two or three miles of the Columbia. Mill-owners generally contract for logs to be delivered at their mills, instead of buying up forest lands. The logging business is a very profitable one, being attended with little expense besides the cutting of the logs. There are in all Oregon, as nearly as can be estimated, one hundred and fifty-three saw-mills; thirty-eight being run by steam. Of the mills of Washington Territory there are not so many, but much larger ones, being chiefly engaged in making lumber for export.