United States Department of Agriculture Early Forestry Research in the South A Personal History Philip C. Wakeley WITH FOREWORD AND COMMENTS BY James P. Barnett AUTHORS Philip C. Wakeley, Deceased, Retired as a Research Forester in 1964 after working for 40 years for the USDA Forest Service, Southern Forest Experiment Station, in New Orleans, LA 70113. James P. Barnett, Retired Chief Silviculturist and Emeritus Scientist, USDA Forest Service, Southern Research Station, Pineville, LA, 71360. PHOTO CREDITS Cover: This classic photo of the old man with a planting bar and a bucket of trees was the logo of Yazoo-Little Tallahatchie (Y-LT) Flood Prevention Project for 25 years (1948 to 1985). The Y-LT Project by the U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service was the largest tree-planting project (835,900 acres successfully reforested) that this country has known and was established to rehabilitate highly eroded lands in north Mississippi (Williston 1988). The Y-LT was a congressionally funded program which applied the reforestation and soil restoration technology developed by early Southern Forest Experiment Station scientists. The photo showing W.C. Turpin of Lafayette County, Mississippi, preparing to plant more trees while his brother plows in the valley, provides an outstanding example of good land use. Unless otherwise noted, the photographs were from collections of the U.S. Forest Service, the Louisiana Forestry Commission (now Louisiana Office of Forestry), and the Louisiana Forestry Association. These organizations have extensive photo collections and many of the early photographs were interchanged between organizations so that the identity of many of the original photographers has been lost. Professional photographers Elemore Morgan and Tommy Kohara took many of these photographs. Sources for others are identified with the photograph. DISCLAIMER The use of trade or firm names in this publication is for reader information and does not imply endorsement by the U.S. Department of Agriculture of any product or service. PESTICIDE PRECAUTIONARY STATEMENT This publication reports research involving pesticides. It does not contain recommendations for their use, nor does it imply that the uses discussed here have been registered. All uses of pesticides must be registered by appropriate State and Federal agencies before they can be recommended. caution: Pesticides can be injurious to humans, domestic animals, desirable plants, and fish or other wildlife—if they are not handled or applied properly. Use all pesticides selectively and carefully. Follow recommended practices for the disposal of surplus pesticides and pesticide containers. First printed April 2011 Slightly revised, redesigned, and reprinted May 2016 Forest Service Research & Development Southern Research Station General Technical Report SRS-137 Southern Research Station 200 W.T. Weaver Blvd. Asheville, NC 28804 www.srs.fs.usda.gov EARLY FORESTRY RESEARCH IN THE SOUTH A Personal History Philip C. Wakeley with foreword and comments by James P. Barnett Abstract Philip C. Wakeley, a pioneer research scientist for the U.S. Forest Service, Southern Forest Experiment Station in New Orleans, began his career in 1924. He had an illustrious career with the Southern Station, and his research became the basis for the reforestation of the South’s devastated forests. Upon his retirement in 1964, he presented the Station a personal overview of his early research, station programs, and personalities of many early scientists. Never before published, this history presents an intriguing look at the development of forestry research in the South from the eyes of one of the Southern Station’s most prominent scientists. Keywords: Forestry research, history of southern forestry, pine plantation management, reforestation of southern pines, seed and seedling physiology. how to cite this publication: Wakeley, Philip C.; Barnett, James P. 2011. Early forestry research in the South: a personal history. Gen. Tech. Rep. SRS-137. Asheville, NC: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Southern Research Station, 159 p. Contents 1 Foreword 1 Introduction 2 The Need for Management 3 Establishment of Research Programs 5 Wakeley’s Personal History and Research Accomplishments 7 A Biased History of the Southern Forest Experiment Station through Fiscal Year 1933 9 Preface 11 The Southern Station in 1924 12 The Station’s Program 16 The Physical Plant 18 My Own Early Work 20 Employment Status 22 Examples of Primitive Research 22 Experimental Plantations at Bogalusa 24 Work Trading 25 The 200-Acre Tract 28 Red Bateman 31 The “Extensive Survey” 42 Other Events of the Primitive Era 43 Initiation of Research on Florida Sand Hills 45 Recruits and Visitors 46 Lost Opportunities 47 Progress and Growing Pains 49 “Scoring” Research 50 “Command-Performance” Publications 51 The South Pasture Fire of 1928 54 Fire and Brown Spot 56 Brown Spot and Fungicides 58 The Era of Expansion and Recognition 59 Improved Approach and Execution 62 Growth of the Station Staff 64 Junior Foresters 66 Temporary Field Assistants 69 Old Hands 76 Balance and Diversification 78 Pessin’s Competition-Density Study 80 Poisoning Scrub Oaks 81 The Bottom-Land Hardwood Survey 84 Recognition 84 Control of Sap Stain 87 The Southern Forest Survey 90 Erosion and Flood Control Research 94 Crossett 97 Forest Pathologist Paul Siggers 99 The Occasional Papers 102 Organization and Administration 102 Divisions 103 Executive Assistant 105 The McNeill Tract 108 Starke and Lake City 109 Roy Chapman 111 Surface Phenomena 111 Better Equipment 113 Visitors and Local Characters 118 Deflections 118 The Copeland Report 120 The South Pasture Report 126 Personal Preoccupations 126 Flops and Failures 130 Partial Successes 139 Hybridization 142 Technical Bulletin 492 152 Depression and Suspense 156 Significance of Wakeley’s and his Colleagues’ Contributions 159 Literature Cited Early Forestry Research in the SoutH: A Personal History Forew0rd Introduction The forests of the Southern United States were little influenced by man until the mid-19th century when they become the focus of an early export lumber business. Longleaf pine (Pinus palustris Mill.) was the choice species due to its straightness and self pruning that produced high quality lumber and high resin content that limited decay and insect attack. The South’s original longleaf pine dominated forest is estimated at 90 million acres. As the supply of virgin stands began to decline in the Carolinas around 1860, harvesting gradually moved south and west and by the early 1900s was concentrated in the West Gulf Region. The introduction of railroad logging increased the efficiency to the point that insufficient longleaf trees remained uncut to provide for regeneration. Loblolly pine (P. taeda L.), a more aggressive seeder than longleaf, began to occupy what had been longleaf sites. But, loblolly regeneration lacks the fire resistance of longleaf and was easily destroyed on fire prone sites. Millions of acres of A longleaf pine stand typical of those both upland and coastal plains were converted to agriculture, but that occupied nearly 90 million acres of much of those lands proved unsuited to such use and were soon the lower Coastal Plain when European settlers arrived. 2 Early Forestry Research in the SoutH: A Personal History abandoned. Both cutover and abandoned agricultural lands were considered open range and subjected to frequent burning and heavy grazing by cattle and hogs. These uses further complicated reforestation. The rebuilding of the South’s southern pine forest was a major challenge as well as a major opportunity. The Need for Management The South initially depended upon European trained foresters to implement management and provide forestry training. George W. Vanderbilt early recognized the need for reforestation of his cutover land when he hired Gifford Pinchot in 1892 as a forester for his Biltmore Estate near Asheville, NC. When Dr. Carl Schenck replaced Gifford Pinchot in 1885, he established the Biltmore Forest School, which was one of the first scientifically, conducted forestry schools in this country. The need for forest management expanded quickly as the heavy harvest by lumber industries swept across the South. Northern investors came into the South in the late 1880s, purchased land inexpensively, and built mills for processing This land is typical of the cutover land in the West Gulf Coastal Plain Region. timber. For example, the Great Southern Lumber Company in Harvesting was very complete in this Bogalusa, LA, ran four, 8-foot band saws that could produce 1 western region and few seed trees million board feet of lumber every 24 hours for more than two remained to regenerate the longleaf pine decades (Kerr 1958). forest. Many millions of acres of such land needed reforestation. A survey of the South’s forest resource in the early 1930s indicated that < 10 percent of the old-growth longleaf pine type remained and about 27 percent of the acreage had been clearcut without possible means of natural regeneration (table 1). It is also apparent that the longleaf forests in lower Coastal Plain topography had been more aggressively harvested and the proportion in clearcut conditions was over 37 percent. Here, too, the proportion with reproduction was less than for the more upland areas. This sample from the longleaf pine type by the Southern Forest Survey indicates the general condition of the South’s forest resources as a result of several decades of intensive harvesting (Wahlenberg