THE UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN 
Vol. 5. No. 2 
-~, 
Madison, Wisconsin April, 1956 
Widening of Beitline Highway through Arboretum 
 The Wisconsin Highway Department has announced plans for making a divided
highway of the present Beitline by constructing another lane about 30 feet
north of and paralleling the present road, work to start in 1956. As far
as the Arboretum is concerned the new lane will be laid out on a right-of-way
which was acquired at the time the present road was built, about a decade
ago. Although the right-ofway thus laid out cut deep into many of our plantings
on the north side of the road, at the time we felt there was good reason
to believe that a second lane would never be built, Therefore, we continued
caring for these plantings, and added to them to a limited extent, particularly
in the way of some screen plantings. Whatever the worth of the new road as
a highway, there can be no question that its construction is in the nature
of a disaster to the Arboretum, The new fence line will be at all points
at least 66 feet north of the present one and in order to make the planned
fill in certain places it appears that a greater width than this will be
required. We will lose many of our largest white pines, nearly all our spruce
planting adjacent to the Leopold Pines, most of our screen plantings above
the prairie, most of our thriving sugar maple stand east of this, and a number
of fine large old oaks, Complicating matters further will be the inevitable
deposition on our land of damaging clayey subsoil, resulting from the erosion
which always accompanies construction of this type. We feel that the fire
hazard will be materially increased, particularly where the Leopold Pines
are concerned, since the new road will be practically "on top" of them, as
it were, We are not as fortunate as the University of Washington Arboretum
at Seattle where an aroused public opinion caused governmental agencies to
modify their plan for using Arboretum land for the Seattle approach to an
$18 million dollarbridge across Lake Washington, with the end result of probably
shifting the proposedbridge site several miles distant, 
Winter Bird Records 
 Prof. J, J, Hickey of the Department of Forestry & Wildlife Management
reports that during the past winter the following more or less unusual birds
have been observed in the Arboretum: 1) A saw-whet owl in the white cedars
near the