Mississippi Forests and Forestry

Abstract

In Mississippi Forests and Forestry, James E. Fickle attempts to construct a comprehensive history of forest use in Mississippi, recording changes in the state's woodlands from pre-Columbian times through the twentieth century. He consults an impressive array of source materials, ranging from government documents, newspapers, interviews, and contemporary accounts to published research in many relevant fields, to address topics such as Native American forest use, vast deforestation during the “cut out and get out” era, and subsequent reforestation efforts by the evolving profession of forestry in cooperation with the government and the lumber industry. Fickle competently narrates developments in scientific forestry, public policy, and lumbering technology and offers a balanced discussion of recent conservation issues in the concluding chapter. The need for this study is evident as little attention has been paid to the forest and conservation history of Mississippi, despite the forest's enormous economic and cultural importance to the state and its inhabitants. Previous research on the subject has largely focused on the human exploitation of the pine forests of southern and central Mississippi, and Fickle continues that trend. Only a few pages are devoted to the vast hardwood forests that covered well over one-third of the state at the time of the European conquest. One would also expect more information on the basic ecology of Mississippi's diverse forests; Fickle can even be accused of not seeing the forest for the trees, as “forest” in this book generally amounts to little more than an economic resource, measured solely in terms of merchantable timber.