A Brief History of Forestry.

We can distinguish at least seven regions thus differently developed: the Northwest with Bohemia, Moravia and the remaining part of Silesia, settled the longest, and the longest under forest management; the Northeast, Galicia with the Carpathian Mountains, still largely either exploited or untouched; the Danube lands or Austria proper, with the Vienna forest and the forests connected with the saltworks in Upper Austria and Styria, under some management since the 12th and 16th centuries respectively; the Alp territory, including Tyrol and Salzburg, parts of Styria, Karinthia and Krain, much devastated long ago, and offering all the problems of the reboisement work of France; the Coast lands along the Adriatic with Dalmatia, Istria and Trieste, which, from ancient times under Venetian rule, bring with them the inheritance of a mismanaged limestone country, creating the problems of the “Karst” reforestation which has baffled the economist and forester until the present time; the two new provinces east of this region, Bosnia and Herzegovina, whose rich forest areas have only lately begun to be treated under modern conservative ideas; and finally Hungary with a great variety of conditions in itself.

The large forest per cent. (a little over 24,000,000 acres or over 32 % of the land area) is due to the mountainous character of the country, the Alps occupying a large area on the west and southwest, the Carpathians stretching for 600 miles on the northeast, various mountain ranges encircling Bohemia, the Sudetes forming part of the northern frontier, and the Wiener Wald and other lower ranges being distributed over the empire and bounding the fertile valleys of the Danube and its tributaries. At least 20 per cent. is unproductive.

The climate in the northern portion of Austria is similar to that of southern Germany; in the southern portions to that of Italy, while Hungary partakes of the characteristics of a continental plains climate with low rainfall and extreme temperature ranges.

In addition to the tree species found in Germany there are of economic value four species of pine (Pinus austriaca, cembra, pinea, halepensis), two oaks (Quercus ilex and suber), and the chestnut (Castanea vesca). Conifer forest is prevailing in Austria (with 82 %), deciduous forest in Hungary, mostly beech and oak (with 75 %); 27 % being oak in pure stands.

The following pages refer to Austria proper, Hungarian conditions being treated separately further on.

The value of the total raw product exported from the Austrian forests (some 180 million cubic feet) may be estimated at over 50 million dollars annually.

1. Property Conditions

On the whole, property conditions developed not unsimilarly to those of Germany. There were freemen and serfs to start with, developing into barons, peasants, burghers; there were ban forests, royal domain, forests of the mark, and private properties; rights of user or servitudes and all the methods and conditions that were developed in other parts of Europe are also found here, only perhaps differing in time and rate of progress in their development.

As a result of gradual changes, the present distribution of property resulted, in which the State ownership is comparatively small, namely, in Austria proper not more than 7.3 % (with 2.8 million acres of which nearly one-third is unproductive land), while private ownership represents over 58.6 %. Of this, 34 % is in large landed estates, among which those of the princes of Liechtenstein and of Schwarzenberg with round 350,000 acres and 290,000 acres respectively are the largest; and 25 others with from 50,000 to 230,000 acres may be named. By the middle of the 19th century, at least 75 % of the forest area was in large compact properties, a guarantee for the possibility of forest management; the industrial development of the last decade has, however, led to considerable exploitation. In upper and lower Austria and in the Alpine regions small private ownership prevails. The communal forest comprises 13 %, entailed forest 8 %, and the rest belongs to church and other institutions. These so-called Fondsforste are in part under government administration.

2. First Attempts at Forest Control

The oldest record of attempts at an orderly management in any part of the empire seems to date back to the 12th century, when the city forest of Vienna had been placed under management. During the 16th and 17th century this property appears to have been managed upon the basis of careful surveys and estimates. We also find a definite forest organization in the forests attached to the ducal salt mines in Styria by 1524, and the dams, canals and water works for floating timber developed by 1592 through Thomas Seeauer were the wonder of the times.

In 1524 also, Archbishop Mathæus Lang of Wellenburg issued a forest ordinance which was full of wise prescriptions, probably little heeded. A forest ordinance of 1599 refers to burning of tops and care of young growth in fellings.

Generally speaking, as in Germany proper, forest ordinances were issued from time to time, by the dukes under the theory of the Forsthoheit, applying to limited territories and attempting to regulate forest use. No uniformity existed.

The iron industry in the more northern provinces had led early to a more conservative use of forest properties for fuel, and since the mines were regal property the dukes had a special interest in their conservation.

In the Alp territory, especially in Styria, the regal right to the mines combined with the Forsthoheit led early to the reservation by the dukes of whatever forest was not fenced or owned by special grant for the use of the mines. In addition, a superior right was asserted by them in some of the private forests to all the forest produce beyond the personal requirements of the owners, for use of the mines at a small tax; and what other private property existed was burdened by innumerable rights of user. The exercise of these rights, and the warfare against irksome restrictions led to widespread illegal exploitation and devastation, which as early as the 15th century had proceeded to such an extent that in Tyrol associations for protection against the torrents were already then in existence. Yet in this province, scantily populated, with one-third of its area unproductive and one-third forested, wasteful exploitation continued until recent times.

In Krain, which was unusually well wooded, forest reservations were made for the use of the mines and furnaces in 1510 and 1515, these reservations comprising all forest lands within a given radius. The balance was mostly divided among small owners, whose unrestricted, unconservative exploitation continued into the latter half of the 19th century.

In Styria, nearly one-half wooded and one-third unproductive, a regulated management was attempted as early as 1572, and by subsequent forest ordinances of 1695, 1721 and 1767 devastation was to be checked. But the resistance of the peasants to the regulations and the inefficiency of the forest service were such that no substantial improvement resulted.

In Galicia, unusually extensive rights of user in the crown forests led to their devastation, and the attempts to regulate the exercise of these rights by ordinances in 1782 and 1802 were unsuccessful.

The forest area along the coast of the Adriatic in Istria and Dalmatia had furnished shiptimber even to the ancients. The Venetians becoming the owners of the country in the 15th century declared all forests national property, reserved for shiptimber, and placed them under management. They instituted a forest service, regulated pasturing, and forbade clearing. The oak coppice was to be cut in 8 to 12 year rotation, with standards to be left for timber, etc. A reorganization of this service with division into districts is recorded in the 16th century, when Charles V, in 1520, instituted a “forest college,” i.e., administration. But the district officers, capitani ai boschi, being underpaid, carried on a nefarious trade on their own account, and by 1775, the whole country was already ruined in spite of attempts at reform; the “Karst” problem remained unsolved; and, when Austria secured Dalmatia, in 1897, that country too was found in the same deplorable condition, the forest area, there in the hands of the peasants, having suffered by pasture and indiscriminate cutting.

It was the work of Maria Theresa to reform the administration of the various branches of government, and wholesome legislation was also extended to the forest branch by her forest ordinance of 1754, which remained in force until 1852. It relieved the private owners, who held most of the forest area, from the restrictions hitherto imposed, except in the frontier forests. These, for strategic reasons, were to be managed according to special working plans prepared by the “patriotic economic society.” The management of communal forests also was specially regulated. Otherwise the ordinance merely recommended in general terms orderly system and the stopping of abuses.

In 1771, another forest ordinance proposed to extend the same policy of private unrestricted ownership to the Karst forests, with the idea that thereby better conditions would most likely be secured; but, since here the property was not as in Bohemia in large estates but in small farmers’ hands, the result was disastrous, as we shall see later: it merely led to increased devastation.

The same result followed the increase of private peasant ownership which came with the abolishment of serfdom in 1781. In 1782, an ordinance full of wise prescriptions against wasteful practice intended for the Northwest territory sought to check the improvident forest destruction.

A further wholesome influence on private forest management was exercised by the tax assessment reform in 1788, when not only a more reasonable assessment but for the first time a difference was made in taxation of managed as opposed to unmanaged woods and the epoch-making fertile idea of the normal forest was announced (see p. 115). At the same time the hunting privileges and other burdens, hampering forest properties were abolished, and measures for the extinguishment of the rights of user enacted.

3. Development of Forest Policy

As appears from the foregoing sketch of early attempts at forest control, no uniformity existed in the empire, each province being treated differently and the regal rights being applied differently in each case.

Originally the regular circuit or district governments had charge not only of the management of State forests but also of the forest police and the regulation of the management of communal forests. This supervision was exercised by the political administration, often without technical advisers, and the different provinces had developed this service very variably. While in some provinces no special effort was made to look after these interests, the laws remaining mainly dead letters, in others a better system prevailed. In Styria, for instance, in 1807, five forest commissioners and 20 district foresters were employed; but this organization was of short duration. A loose administration of the forest laws was most general. The movement for reform and to secure a general law for the empire controlling forest use dates from the year 1814; but, only after the political reaction of 1848, and when the severe floods of 1851 had forcibly called attention to the unsatisfactory state of things was the necessity of change recognized. In 1852, such a general law was enacted, supplanting all the forest ordinances (with minor exceptions).

This law, which in the main is still in force, distinguishes between ban forests and protective forests. The former are such as require in their management consideration of their protective value to adjoining private or State property and personal safety, e.g., to prevent landslides, snowslides, avalanches, etc. Protection forests are specially located forests which for their own continuance as well as for that of neighboring ones must be managed under special restrictions, e.g., on sand dunes, shores of waters, steep slopes. The dangers which they are to prevent being more of an indirect or hidden nature, and only produced by their mismanagement, the control also is of a more general nature, the owner being allowed to manage his property within general prescriptions, while the ban forests are protective forests of a higher order and are more strictly and more directly controlled by the authorities. The declaration of a ban forest and the prescription for the conservative management depend on the findings of a commission assisted by experts (since 1873).

The execution of the law however, being left to the political administration of the provinces, jealousies between imperial and provincial governments, and fear of resistance and ill will of forest owners prevented a strict and uniform application of the law. Hence, from time to time, we find ministerial rescripts, and special provincial legislation to secure a more energetic enforcement of the law.

At first, the reform had reference mainly to the Alp districts, which had suffered the most, and, in Tyrol, at least, an organization was created in 1856 which was to manage the State forests, supervise the management of corporation forests and exercise the forest police. Not until the years 1871-74, however, was a similar service extended to other portions of the empire, but at the end of that period the entire empire had been placed under the administration of a “forest protective service.” an organization quite distinct from the State forest administration.

In 1900, there were placed under this service nearly two million acres of protective, and somewhat over 150,000 acres of ban forests, but some 5 to 6 million acres of private or communal forest was under some other restrictive policy.

In 1888, this service consisted of 14 forest inspectors, 56 forest commissioners, 63 forest adjuncts and 80 assistants and forest guards; in addition 252 special appointees and officers of the State forest administration were doing duty in this service, so that altogether nearly 500 persons were then employed in carrying on the protective forest policy of the State. In 1910, there were 388 technical attachés to the provincial authorities employed, and 124 on reboisement work, while the State administration employed only 297 officials of the higher grade.

The law declares the function of this technical service to be: “to assist the political government by technical advice and observation in supervising forest protection, and in the application of the forest laws.”

In 1883, the functions of this organization were extended “to instruct and encourage forest owners in forest culture, and to manage forests designated to be so managed.” The service has been so satisfactory that, while at first much complaint against the enforcement of the regulations was heard, owners now ask constantly for its extension.

The details of the duties devolving upon this organization are found in a series of laws, applicable to different parts of the empire, which are based upon the recognition of protection forests, in which sanctioned working plans regulate the management. Forcible reforestation and employment of competent foresters in these are obligatory. Now, altogether about 60 % of the Austrian forest area is managed under working plans.

A special reboisement law for the extinction of destructive torrents was the result of unusual damage by floods in Tirol and Karinthia, in 1882. The basis for this legislation was laid by a translation from the French of Demontzey’s great work on the reboisement of mountains, by v. Seckendorff in 1880, and a subsequent report by the same author in 1883. A law, similar to that of the French was enacted in 1884, for the regulation of torrential streams. A special fund for the work was created to which the interested parties are required to contribute, assisted by annual subventions from the State. The contributions of the State have averaged from 40 to 60 %, of the provinces 20 to 50 %, the interested parties having contributed 30 % of the round five million dollars expended on this work by 1901. In 1910, the contribution to the melioration fund by the State had grown to 1.6 million dollars. At the same time, for the regulation of the lower rivers an appropriation of $1,350,000 was made, of which $400,000 was to be used for reforestation work.

This work as well as the reforestation of the Karst (see p. 173) under the laws of 1881, 1883, 1885, is carried on by the forest protective service.

On the whole, the forest policy of Austria tends toward harmony with forest owners and liberation of private property. By reduction of railroad freights, which are under government management, by abolition of export duties, by reasonable tax assessments, etc., the wood export trade (now exceeding 30 million dollars) is favored; by the extinction of rights of user under liberal laws improvement in forest management is made possible, the Emperor setting a good example by having renounced, in 1858, his superior right to forest reservations in the Alp districts.

The best exemplification of the spirit of the Austrian forest policy and of the methods of forest organization and administration is to be found in the administration of the provinces of Bosnia and Herzegovina described in a volume published in 1905 by the veteran Austrian forester, Ludwig Dimitz.6

Here, the Austrian government has in the short time of 25 years succeeded in bringing orderly conditions into the forest management. Until 1878, these countries were provinces of Turkey and were placed under Austrian suzerainty as a result of the Russo-Turkish War. The Turks had already attempted a management of the forest lands, which were in their entirety claimed by the Sultan. Property conditions being entirely unclear when the Austrians assumed the administration, these questions had first to be settled by a survey. This survey resulted in showing a forest area of 6.3 million acres, 51 % of the land area, of which probably all but about 1.5 million acres is private or communal property; half of the state property is fully stocked and it is estimated that about 100 million cubic feet is the annual increment.

4. State Forest Administration

The State domain in the first half of the 19th century had been reduced by sales from nearly 10 million acres to 4.5 million acres, and to a little over 3 million acres in 1855. In that year, about one-half of this property was handed over to the National Bank to secure the State’s indebtedness of $30,000,000, and between 1860 and 1870 further sales reduced the domain to about its present size of 1.8 million acres productive forest. In 1872, however, a new policy, and the present organization were instituted.

Before 1849, the forest properties which the Crown or State owned in the various territories were not managed as a unit or in any uniform manner, but a number of separate provincial or territorial forest administrations existed which were often connected with mining administrations and were placed under the Minister of Finance. These, under the influence of the educated foresters issuing from the newly established forest school, had, to be sure, been much improved; nevertheless the Cameralists, as in Germany, were at the head of affairs and kept the technical development back until after the revolution of 1848, when the accession of Franz Joseph I brought many reforms and changes in methods of administration.

A ministry of Soilculture and Mining was created in that year, and, as a branch of it, a forest department, separated from the department of the Chase. To the head of this forest department was called a forester, Rudolf Feistmantel, who elaborated an organization. But, before much had been accomplished, the Ministry and its forest department were abolished (1853) and the forest domain again transferred to the Ministry of Finance.

Feistmantel returned in 1856 as Chief of the forest division in that Ministry, and his organization of the forest property of the State into forest districts under forest managers and into provincial “forest directions” was perfected.

Matters, however, did not thrive, and, only when public attention and indignation had been aroused by a policy of selling State property, a change of attitude took place in 1872 which led to the present organization. This places the State forest administration in the Department of Agriculture, with an “Oberlandforstmeister” and two assistants as superior officers, and the rest of the organization is also very nearly the same as that in vogue in most German States, each province having a directive service of “Oberforstmeister” with “Forstmeister” as inspectors, and “Oberförster” with the assistance of “Forstwarte” as executive officers. In addition a special corps of “forest engineers” and “superior forest engineers” is provided for the elaboration of working plans. Lately (1904), a re-organization of the central office provided, besides the department of administration of State and Funds forests, a department of reboisement and correction of torrents, and a department of forest policy charged with the promotion of forest culture, including the education of foresters and similar matters.

Most of the State property is located in the Alps and Carpathian mountains at an elevation above 2,000 feet, hence financial results do not make a good showing.

Since 1885 it has been the policy to add to the State forest area by purchase, and by 1898, over 350,000 acres had been added to it.

5. Progress of Forest Organization

Since 1873, working plans according to unified principles have been prepared for most of the State property, so that, by 1898, about 82 % was under regulated management.

The progress made in bringing forest areas under organized management varied greatly in the different provinces.

In northeastern Austria, the first methods of regulated management consisted, as in the neighboring territories of Germany, in a simple division into felling areas. The example of the neighbors was also followed later in the northwestern provinces, and in both regions this method was improved upon by allotment according to the propositions of Hartig and Cotta. In addition, since 1810, the method of the Austrian “Kameraltaxe” with the new and fertile idea of the “normal forest” began to be employed (see p. 115). The new method now largely employed is an area allotment checked by the normal forest formula.

Especially in Bohemia, most of the large baronial properties had, by 1848, been put under a regular system of management according to Saxon and Prussian precedent. The influence of the former was especially strong, and Saxon foresters were largely employed to regulate the management. Most prominent among these was Judeich, who became the Director of the Austrian forest school at Weisswasser, (afterwards of Tharandt). By 1890, over 83 % of the total forest area of Bohemia capable of such management had been placed under rational working plans according to the most modern conception, and nearly the same proportion in the neighboring provinces of Moravia and Silesia.

In the Alps territory and in the Danube provinces, the regulation of forest management has not progressed with the same rapidity, partly owing to the existence of the many hampering rights of user; only here and there, are properties managed intensively. By 1890, only 23 % were managed under rational working plans (40 % state and 60 % private and communal property), mostly regulated by a combined area and volume method.

In Styria, in the forests attached to mines, we find already in 1795 quite a remarkable effort in the matter of working plans. Such a plan by an unknown author deals with volume tables and sample area methods for determining the stock. But the fine plan was stowed away in a cupboard, and when, in 1830, forest counselor Wunderbaldinger proposed to apply a similar plan he had to wait seven years before permission for a trial was granted. He continued, however, the organization of these forests until 1848, using Hundeshagen’s “use per cent.” in the selection forest, and volume allotment for the woods managed under clearing system.

In lower Austria, the Vienna state forest of 70,000 acres had for a long time received attention; the first thorough forest survey and yield calculation being made in 1718-20, revised in 1782-86, and regulated for the shelterwood system in 1820. Within the last 50 years, the method has been changed again and again, until in 1882 the present Austrian method based on normal stock principles was applied. Since in this province 50 % of the forest area is small peasant property and communal forest, which are usually managed without systematic plans, the 33 % under working plans represents more than half of the area capable of such management.