Pt0.4 Th?DuelinTim*? Prot?fM?..-i"'">?l, New. -'74,11)82 His Pine Stand Reflects A Belief In The Land And Lifetime Of Effort RALPH W. PICKETT After saying that Pickett had "one yf the finest stands of pine timber in North Carolina." Sullivan added. "His is an amazing story of success." Extension forestry special ists at NQSU say people like Pickett will largely determine the future of the forest products industry in North Carolina. While several companies own large tracts in the state, about 85 percent of the state's woodland is still in the hands of private owners. Duplin County Agri cultural Extension Agent Snodie Wjlson said although his county has the highest gross agricultural income in the state, the majority of the land in the county is still forested. Most of this land is producing far below its potential. Wilson added, opossums and bobcats." Pickett also spoke as fond ly of bears living in hi woods asilth vcre family pets. Pickett has lived off his woodland at the same time he has been improving it. He purchased an old truck early in life and started "pulp wooding." always cutting diseased, crooked and over crowded trees first. He has harvested larger trees for sawtimber or for poles and pilings. And all the time, his woodland has been increas ing in value. Pickett sold about a third of his original acreage many years ago. He also cleared 250 acres, which his son uses to grow corn and soybeans. That's okay with the father, for he had much rather be a tree farmer than a crop farmer. Amone the lessons that Pickett says he has learned from nearly a half-centurv in the woods are these: "There's more in the man than in the land." "There is no sorry land. Land is good, better and best. All it needs is tutor ing." Pickett is still robust and not about to retire. "Sitting around bores me," he de clared. And of his accom plishment. he said, "The Lord has been good to me." The spotlight was focused on Pickett last December at the Governor's Conference on Retention of Prime Farm and Forest Land at North Carolina State University. William G. Sullivan, a farmer and conference speaker from Mount Olive, singled Pickett out as "a good example of what hard woik and deter mination can do." pocoson. an old ov.g mat was too wet to grow anything but a bramble of briars. Little grew on it of commercial value. Pickett has turned his thicket into a prized forest with hard work and sound forestry management prac tices. One of his first goals was to improve the drainage and in the early days he did this with his own muscles, a shovel and a broadax. "I'd go in the woods early in the morning and never think about the time until the sun started setting. That's how determined I was to make something out of this place." he said. Pickett was later able to hire ditching done with a backhoe and now his forest is crisscrossed with about nine miles of ditches that keep his pines out of standing water anc serve as ftrelanes. Along with ditches. Pickett has used fire as a forestry management tool. The value of fire was demonstrated to him accidentally when wild fire once burned for 31 days on his land. The burned area came back full of pines. Now, Pickett uses "con trolled burping" on a regular basis to reduce undesirable hardwoods and "to release" his Dines. "You use a slow, creeping fire," he explained, "and it's like giving the pines a shot of fertilizer." Along with stimulating his pines. Pickett said controlled burning also aids wildlife. "A lot of tender, young vegetation comes in after a fire." he explained. "Deer don't bother crops around here because they can find plenty to eat in the woods. And we've got rabbits, squirrels, raccoons. Seventy ? three ? year - old Ralph W. Pickett of Beula ville can easily show people what he has done with his life. Among other things, he has grown a fcVrest. It has taken him 48 years. Pickett's forest covers 1,500 acres in the Cedar Forks Community of Duplin County, and it is filled with magnificent stands of long leaf. pond and loblolly pines. Some people call it one of the finest, privately-owned tracts of woodland in North Carolina. Pickett's life in the woods began at the age of 25. It was on Nov. 2, 1934, to be exact, during the Great Depression. Pickett took all the money he had ? $100 ? and used it as down payment on 2,325 acres owned by Goldsboro Lumber Co. The total pur chase price was $1,600 or less than 69 cents an acre. "Times were hard," he recalls, "and no one could understand why I would buy woodsland on credit." Local folks described Pickett's purchase in various ways ? Pickett's thicket, a A I: a! nppilCUTIOn Forms For Ordering Tree Seedlings Available Application forms for forest tree seedlings from state nurseries are now avail able on request from Direc tor, N.C. Division of Forest Resources, P.O. Box 27687, Raleigh, NC 27611 or locally from offices of the county forest ranger or the soil conservation service. Appli cations will be filled in the same order they are re ceived. Applications must be at the office of the Division of Forest Resources at least four weeks prior to shipment. Weather permitting, .shipments should begin Dec. 1. Hardwood species are sold in units of 100 seedlings; others in units of 1,000. Genetically improved loblolly pine seedlings will be limited to a maximum of 100.000 per applicant. Order early. This report was edited by the Duplin County AES. Office Accepting Bids For Watershed Project Bids for the second and ? major phase of the Limestone ? Creek watershed project will he received until 10 a.m. Dec. 0 at4he Duplin County ? Soil and Water conservation ? . District office. I Major items of work will be ? 105,435 feet of channel rcs ? toration. b2.l Ih feet of chan " net excavation. 48 acres of ; clearing, laying 2.83b feet of ? 15-inch corrugated metal - pipe inlets, digging 20 per ! mancnt sediment basins in the channel and planting 40 acres of permanent vegeta tion. The cost is estimated be tween S500.000 and $1 mil lion. Invitations to bid were mailed to contractors last week, said Kenneth Futreal. Duplin County soil conser vationist. Five requests for T further information had been received by Wednesday. "It looks like we'll have a lot of interest among contractors I for this project." Futreal said. Only two bids were re ceived on the first phase. Because at least three bid ders are required on an initial bid call, the project was rcaovcrtised. Only one bid was received for the second bid opening. Futreal said. Phelps and White Con struction Co. of Windsor submitted the bid of $74,000 Oct. 20. The initial phase calls for 21.000 feet of channel restoration and in stallation of three sediment basins, which are deep spots in the channel to catch sediment running off fields. When sediment in the basins reaches a specified depth, it ' is removed to prevent channel clogging. When Phelps and White completes forms concerning ' bonds and they are verified by the state Soil Conser- 1 vation Service office, the ' construction order can be ' issued. Futreal said. "I hope that work can b,e started bv Nov. 22." Futrekl ' said. Prospective Phase II bidders may visit the work site Nov. 16 and Nov. 30. They will assemble at 10 ' a.m. on each date at the SCS office and be escorted on a tour of the area, which is on and near Limestone Creek north and west of Beulaville. Other inspection arrange ments should be made with Calvin R. Mercer, chairman >f the district and contracting officer for the Duplin County Board of Commissioners. Futreal said 58 land own ers have applied for long term land treatment con tracts for their farms in the watershed area. Land treat ment is designed to prevent erosion of soil into the chan nels. Contact Lenses $oqoo MZm per lens with prescription Types: B&L A/0 DOW CORNING gel flex HYDROCURVE Other Types Also Available Price May Vary East Coast Optical Xenansville L OFFER GOOD Tl JAN. 1, 1983 Locol Conservation News Bv R. Wade Biddix, Soil Conser vationist, USDA-Soil Conservation Service I want to taik with you today about "soil Sampling" ? a valuable management tool and the key to reliable soil test information. Many of you are farmers and can readily recognize an area in your fields that is low in either lime or fertilizer. The plants in those areas are usually smaller, sickly and often discolored in various portions of the leaves. When these symptoms occur, it is too late to do anything about that particular crop. The damage has already been done and will need tr be corrected before planting next year's crop. You cannot tell how much lime or fertilizer your fields will require next year b> simply giving them a glance or two. Past experience with your fertilization programs may be of some help, but yoi need to be more scientific. A carefully selected soi sample, followed by a labora tory analysis, will be mos helpful in obtaining high profitable yields from your land. Before you begin collect ing samples, you should outline your farm and field boundaries directly on an aerial photograph, which can 1 be obtained from the ASCS office. Assign a permanent t number to each field or management area. This will enable ><>u to t-ctp accurate ! records of treatment and i crop yield for each area. i When sampling, avoid small areas ? such as i burned wood piles, wet s spots, severely eroded spots, \ old building sites, fence | rows, corner or end-turn | areas, fertilizer bands and I old lime piles. A good sample < should be a composite of t individual cores ? each t taken up to seven inches deep in at least 10 locations j within an area having these s three uniform characteris- s tics: the soil is the same in j color, slope, texture, surface < and internal drainage and t past erosion; the past treat- < ment has been the same. t and. the plant material has 2 been the same over the past few vears. t Be sure to use a clean \ plastic bucket or container to v collect the individual cores |< that .will make up the total t soil sample, especially if s micronutricnts are to be de- I termined. Metal containers. i such as galvanized buckets. y will contaminate the soil t sample with elements such as zinc and copper and give $ misleading results. Never i expose the sample to tools. a containers or floor surfaces r that may contaminate it with s chemical or fertilizer ele- i ments. You should collect the samples three to six months before the crop is to be planted. This will give you ample time to get the soil test back from the laboratory and enable you to plan your lime and fertilizer application be fore the busy planting season . begins. Soils should not be sampled when they are too wet since it is difficult to mix the sample cores. One rule to remember is that if the soil is too wet to plow, it is too wet to collect soil samples. Test results are useful for several years after sampling. Sampling every three to five years usually provides an opportunity to determine fertility changes made with basic treatments and give a new bench mark for further improvement. However, the sandy soils of the Coastal Plains area will probably need to be tested every two or three years because of their low capacity for holding nutrients and most drastic ^ effects of nitrogen which causes soil acidity to de- 4 velop. Practically all plants grow best in neutral to slightly acid soils. Many soils fall in this range naturally, but the use of acid-forming ferti lizers (among them ammo nium sulfate, ammonium ni trate and urea) can cause weak acids to build up. This calls for the use of lime to raise the ph or, when soils arc alkaline, sulfur to lower it. Soil ph is a measure of the relative acidity or alkalinity of a soil measured on a scale of 0 to 14. A ph of 7.0 is neutral, a ph of less than 7.0 is acidic, and a ph above 7.0 is alkaline. The ph unit is logarithmic, meaning that a ph of 5.0 is 10 times more acidic than a ph of 6.0. and 100 times more acidic thar a ph of 7 0. That means that 10 lbs. of fertilizer applied to a soil with a ph of 6.0 is equivalent to 100 lbs. of fertilizer applied to a soil with a ph of 6.0 is equivalent to 100 lbs. of fertilizer ap plied to a soil with a ph of 5.0. The rest becomes tied up >r "fixed" by the hydrogen ons in the soil particles. Ihrough this explanation, it s easy to see the value of a toil test. You should not vaste your money on ferti izers when you really need ime. Stjil testing gives a >et'ei understanding of a iite's nutrient deficiencies ind allows monitoring of heir corrections. If you would like further nformation on soil sampling ind its benefits or need some standard woil sample boxes ind an address as to where to .end your samples, come by he Soil Conservation Service iffice in Kenansville or give is a call at 296-1958 or I96-1546. I also want to inform you hat the Duplin Soil and Vater Conservation District t ill be selling red cedar and ongleaf pine seedlings again his year. The seedlings hould be available around )ec. 15. so if you are nterested. you should place our order soon by calling he above numbers. Like all programs and ervices of the U.S.D.A.. nformation and assistance is vailable to everyone without egard to race, creed, color, ex or national origin. //*? ; 1 lorth Carolina, often called Golf State USA," has ome 330 golf courses. Christmas Sa/e^{p November 26-December 24 ..vT Ladies' Sportswear - Dresses ? Lingerie <* ^ AT*/ OUNT& Jf &/4dJS