Article November 6, 1902 Issue

Utilization of Pine Needles

Scientific American

THE illimitable forests of yellow pine abounding in the State of Oregon, with their accessibility to through lines of transportation, suggested to a German from the forests of Thuringia the transfer of a lucrative business to the Pacific coast. In Germany the leaves never exceed two inches in length, while in Oregon they often exceed thirty inches, and average twenty. In the former country the forest laws are extremely strict and often prohibitive, obliging the maker of the product to use the dried leaves that have fallen to the ground and thus insuring an inferior and less effective quality of goods. In the western state denuding the yellow pine of its leaves has been encouraged, the expert of the forestry commission having pronounced the process beneficial. A tally kept of the weight gathered from a certain number of trees indicated that the crop taken in April weighed 650 pounds, while the same trees in October yielded 775 pounds.

Five hundred pounds is regarded as an average day's work. The leaves are picked into sacks and hurriedly sent to the factory. Exposure to the sun causes the leaves to wilt, and impairs the quality of the product. In picking, the thickest bunches of leaves are selected, and the scanty ones neglected.

In the extraction of pine oil, two thousand pounds of green leaves are required to produce ten pounds of oil. The process is the ordinary one of distillation. In the manufacture of fiber the leaves pass through processes of steaming, washing, drying, etc., twelve in all, occupying four days. Two qualities are produced, first and second. The first, from which no oil has been distilled, is worth, upon the market, about ten cents per pound. The fiber is elastic, and the staple only shorter than the green leaf from which it was made, and with strength sufficient to enable it to be spun and woven into fabrics. Mixed with hair, the fiber makes an excellent material for mattresses or pillows. The oil extracted gives an agreeable flavor to candies. Toilet soaps are made, strongly impregnated with essential oil of pine needles.

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