Three-year-old pine trees in northern Upshur County, Texas

This family farm produced a prolific crop of pine timber in 1997. Efforts to reforest the following spring were almost totally unsuccessful because of April not having any rain.

In February 2002, my forester, Dana Moon, and I made a new attempt to reestablish a stand of loblolly pine and it is proving to be somewhat more successful.

There are some dead spots, but if we get a really rainy year, I am hoping there will be "volunteers" spring up in those zones eventually as happened with a vengeance during the late 1970s. The dead spots coincide with where I used to see yucca plants growing, meaning that the sand there is unusually fine and well-drained and giving rise to an almost desert-like micro habitat.

The larger tree in the background is a survivor from 1998.