A number of experiment stations were established in various parts of the country by the Administration of Crownlands, and a very considerable and advanced literature testifies to the good education and activity of the higher forest service.
Two forestry journals, Lesnoj Journal (since 1870) and Lessopromychlenny Vestnik, the first bi-monthly, the latter weekly, besides several lesser ones, keep the profession informed.
There are in existence several general societies for the encouragement of silviculture. Probably the oldest, which ceased to exist in 1850, was the Imperial Russian Society for the Advancement of Forestry which was founded in 1832. It published a magazine and provided translations of foreign books, among which the Forest Mathematics of the noted German forester König, who also prepared yield tables for the Society. (See [p. 135].) A society of professional foresters was founded at St. Petersburg in 1871, another exists in Moscow, and recently two associations for the development of forest planting in the steppes have been formed.
Among the prominent writers and practitioners there should be especially mentioned Theodor Karlowitsch Arnold, who is recognized as the father of Russian forestry. He was the soul of the forest organization work, for which he drew up the instructions in 1845, and as professor, afterwards director, of the Institute for Agronomy and Forestry at Moscow since 1857, he became the teacher of most of the present practitioners. Finally he became the head of the forest department in the Ministry of Apanages where he remained until his death in 1902. He is the author of several classical works on silviculture, forest mensuration, forest management, etc., and, in conjunction with Dr. W. A. Tichonoff, published an encyclopædic work in three volumes. In the first volume, Russland’s Wald (1890), which has been translated into German, the author makes an extended plea for improved forestry practice and describes and argues at length the provisions of the law of 1888. In 1895, he published a history of forestry in Germany, France and Russia. Of other prominent foresters who have advanced forestry in Russia we may cite Count Vargaci de Bedemar, who made the first attempt to prepare Russian growth and yield tables in 1840 to 1850.
Professor A. F. Rudzsky, who was active at the Forest Institute until a few years ago, developed in his volumes especially the mathematical branches and methods of forest organization. The names of Tursky, Kravchinsky and Kaigodorov are known to Russian students of dendrology and silviculture, and among the younger generation the names of Morozov, Nestorov, Orlov, and Tolsky may be mentioned.
It is well known how prominent Russian investigators have become in the natural sciences, and to foresters the work of the soil physicists, Otozky and Dokuchaev would at least be familiar.
4. Forestry Practice.
While then a very considerable activity in scientific direction exists, the practical application of forestry principles is less developed than one would expect, especially in view of the stringent laws. So far not much more than conservative lumbering is the rule.
Generally speaking, the State and crown forests are better managed than the private, many of which are being merely exploited; and in the northern departments large areas remain still inaccessible.