The Training of a Forester

To the young man who is attracted to forestry and begins to consider it as a possible profession, certain questions present themselves. What is forestry? If he takes it up, what will his work be, and where? Does it in fact offer the satisfying type of outdoor life which it appears to offer? What chance does it present for a successful career, for a career of genuine usefulness, and what is the chance to make a living? Is he fitted for it in character, mind, and body? If so, what training does he need? These questions deserve an answer. To the men whom it really suits, forestry offers a career more attractive, it may be said in all fairness, than any other career whatsoever. I doubt if any other profession can show a membership so uniformly and enthusiastically in love with the work. forestry, certain facts about the forest itself must be kept in mind. A forest is not a mere collection of individual trees, just as a city is not a mere collection of unrelated men and women, or a Nation like ours merely a certain number of independent racial groups. A forest, like a city, is a complex community with a life of its own. It has a soil and an atmosphere of its own, chemically and physically different from any other, with plants and shrubs as well as trees which are peculiar to it.