The Use of the National Forests

WHAT THEY ARE FOR.

IN GENERAL.

Use.—National Forests are for use by all the people. Their resources are now used in such a common-sense way that instead of being used up they keep coming. They are for present use, for use a few years ahead, and for use a long time ahead. It is easy to draw a picture of the West, say twenty-five or fifty years from now. The picture will show a great increase in population, in the cities and in the country; it will show innumerable homes, now almost unthought of; it will show a wonderful growth in agriculture and the cultivation of vast areas now unproductive; it will show great strides in manufacturing and in all kinds of industry. This means an enormous increase in the demand upon its natural resources. Without enough wood, water, and forage it would be a very poor kind of a country. If these great resources should become scarce or hard to get, future growth and prosperity would be severely handicapped.

National Forests keep these resources coming in abundance by using them wisely at present.

Production.—The permanent wealth of a country comes from the soil. To insure permanent wealth the soil must be kept productive. Agricultural lands are managed so as to produce the most valuable crops, year after year, without a break. Forest lands also should be managed so as to produce the most valuable crops of timber and wood, year after year, without interruption. Without a plentiful, cheap, and continuous supply of wood, agriculture and all its dependent industries must suffer. And in regions of little rainfall, without a plentiful and steady flow of water for irrigation, agriculture is either impossible or unprofitable.

National Forests from their own soil produce always the greatest possible amounts and the most valuable kinds of timber, wood, and forage; and the Forests themselves make the soil of the surrounding country produce the largest and most useful agricultural crops by supplying it with a steady flow of water for irrigation and by furnishing its settlers with an abundance of timber, and wood, and forage, for home and local business use.

Homes.—Homes are of vital importance to the West, and to the whole country. A land without homes is not worth living in. What the West needs is people who come to stay. The man who skins the land and moves on does the country more harm than good. He may enrich himself and a few others for a very brief time, but he kills the land. He cares nothing for this, because he does not stay in the country, but moves on to new fields and repeats the skinning process. It is he who is the greatest enemy of the home builder.

National Forests are made, first of all, for the lasting benefit of the real home builder. They make it impossible for the land to be skinned. They benefit the man with a home and the man who seeks to build one by insuring protection and wise use of the timber and grass and by conserving the water. In considering what National Forests are for and how they affect the resources of the western mountains, the fact should never be lost sight of that they are for the home builder first, and that their resources are protected and used for his special welfare before everything else.

Plate III. Destructive Use. The Land Skinned, Burned Over, and Left a Barren Waste.

TO PROTECT AND GROW WOOD FOR USE.

The National Forests occupy high mountain lands, rough and rocky, and which will always be of value chiefly for the production of timber and wood. The first thing that is made sure is that the timber is not burnt up; the next, that it is used, though not used up. Before there were any National Forests enormous quantities of the people's timber on the public domain every year went up in smoke. Forests which covered districts as large as the State of Rhode Island were completely wiped out in the course of a few days. It meant losses to the people of millions and millions of dollars. Fire destroys quickly; trees grow slowly. It often takes a hundred years to make good the damage done by a single day's fire.

In National Forests there is a force of men on the ground whose business it is to look out for fire. They have been remarkably successful in keeping it down. Since the fire patrol was started less than one-third of a per cent of the total area of the Forests has been burned over, and the money loss has been insignificant. This is a wonderful improvement over the old conditions on the open public domain, where fires were incessant and enormously destructive.

Hundreds of millions of feet of timber are sold from the National Forests each year. That is why the Forest is protected. The timber is for use. The cuttings do not damage the Forest, because the lumbering operations are so carefully done that the stand is left in first-class condition for a second crop, and after that a third crop and any number of future crops. Fire is kept out of the cut-over lands to give the young growth a fair chance. By wise use the timber crop is made perpetual, and its quality is improved by encouraging a new and better growth of the most useful kinds of trees.

The actual results on private lands where the owners do not care what happens after they have skinned them, are quite different. These lands are usually cut over with the sole object of getting everything possible out of them at one stroke. They are stripped of timber, while the slashings which are left on the ground make good fire traps. Very soon the whole area burns over and the ground becomes a nonproductive waste. A glance from a car window in Michigan, Wisconsin, or Minnesota shows the now absolutely ruined lands which but a short time ago produced magnificent stands of white pine. Think of the great wealth which the people of these States might have made permanent, simply by using the Forests wisely.

Then, again, wood is so very essential in everyday life that it seems unwise to let it be monopolized by individuals or corporations. Actual results show that when public timber lands pass out of the Government's hands they eventually, and often very quickly, fall into the hands of big concerns, which rarely show the slightest tendency to handle them for the greatest good of the people in the long run.

On a National Forest the present and future local demand is always considered first. The Government tries to see that there shall always be enough timber and wood on hand for use by the home builder, the prospector, the miner, the small mill man, the stockman, and all kinds of local industries. If local needs promise to consume it all, nothing is allowed to be shipped out of the country. If it were in the hands of individual or corporate owners, it would very likely he shipped out, regardless of local needs. It would seek the best market. If it were sold locally, the users would have to pay whatever price the owner might demand, and this price might be very unfair.

This is especially important to the mining industry. All mining operations require a great deal of timber. It must be accessible, of suitable quality, fairly cheap, and always on hand. When timber for mines has to be shipped in from a distance at great expense it often makes the operations so costly as to be unprofitable. If the local supply is burned up, the mines suffer. In mining districts one of the chief objects of National Forests is to protect the timber and keep it on hand ready for use in the mines at all times.

TO KEEP THE WATER FLOW STEADY.

It should be clearly understood that in regions of heavy rainfall—for example, on the Pacific slopes in Washington, Oregon, northern California, and Alaska—National Forests are not made for the purpose of regulating the water flow for irrigation. In these localities there is plenty of water to spare. The Forests here are created and maintained to protect the timber and keep it in the people's hands for their own present and future use and to prevent the water from running off suddenly in destructive floods.

In other parts of the West, however, in all the great arid regions of the Rockies and the eastern Pacific slopes, one of the most vital reasons for making and maintaining the National Forests is to save every drop of water and to make it do the most effective work.

No one has yet proved that forests increase the rainfall to any great extent. What they do, and this no one of experience disputes, is to nurse and conserve the rain and snow after they have fallen. Water runs down a barren, hard surface with a rush, all at once. It runs down a spongy, soft surface much more slowly, little by little. A very large part of the rain and snow of the arid regions falls upon the great mountain ranges. If these were bare of soil and vegetation, the waters would rush down to the valleys below in floods. But the forest cover—the trees, brush, grass, weeds, and vegetable litter—acts like a big sponge. It soaks up the water, checks it from rushing down all at once, and brings about an even flow during the whole season.

In irrigation it is very important to have an even flow throughout the growing season, especially toward the end. That is where the trouble usually comes. As a rule the rancher has more water than he can use at the beginning of the season and not enough at the end. The flood waters in the spring can not be used; they run off and go to waste. In order to save these flood waters the Government is now constructing many great reservoirs and canals throughout the West, at enormous cost. These reservoirs store up the flood waters and hold them for use when most needed. That is precisely what the forests of the mountains do, although, of course, in a different way.

The forest cover is also very important in preventing erosion and the washing down of silt. If the slopes were bare and the soil unprotected, the waters would carry down with them great quantities of soil, gradually filling up the reservoirs and canals and causing immense damage to the great irrigation systems. The Government engineers who are building these reservoirs and canals say that their work will be unsuccessful unless the drainage basins at the headwaters of the streams are protected by National Forests.

The home builder, more than anybody else, is vitally interested in a steady flow of water for irrigation. Often his existence depends upon it.

Plate IV. Cattle in a National Forest. The Range is Protected and Wisely Used.

TO KEEP THE RANGE IN GOOD CONDITION.

The use of the range by live stock enters unavoidably into the management of National Forests. All through the western mountains the range goes with the timber; it can not be separated from it. It is a great resource, and of course ought to be used. The way in which it is used has a great deal to do with the growth of young timber and the flow of water. If it is not wasted or used up, but wisely used, it neither harms the forest growth nor has a bad effect on the water flow. If it is over-grazed or destroyed, the young tree growth is stamped down or eaten off, and the soil is left bare and unprotected, to be washed down the slopes into the canals and reservoirs below.

In the use of the range National Forests work first to protect the settler and home builder. They make sure, before everything else, that he has what range he needs for his own stock. Before the Forests were made the settler was at the mercy of the big stockman, who often drove his herds in from a distance and completely grazed off the settler's range right at his own door. This can not happen in a National Forest, because the man with a home is sure of the range near by for his own use, and the big men from a distance are kept away from him.

In allotting the range the small local owners are considered first; then the larger local owners who have regularly used it; then the owners who live at a distance, but who have been regular occupants; and lastly, if there is any room left after these have been provided for, the owners of transient stock.

Special effort is being made to keep down wild animals which damage stock, and the Forest officers, when requested, help to enforce the State and Territorial live stock laws.

A small fee is charged for grazing on the National Forests, because when any man gets for his own special use any property maintained for the use of the whole people, he ought to pay for it. Most people are quite willing to pay the cost of restoring the range and keeping it in good condition, especially when such control does away with the old conflicts of all kinds and assures each man of getting his rights. The men who use the range are not the kind who think they ought to get something for nothing.

National Forests, then, are not made for the special purpose of controlling the live-stock business; they are concerned with it incidentally, and help to regulate the use of the range because the people want it regulated.

TO USE WELL ALL THE LAND.

There are many other incidental uses which National Forests help to bring about and greatly assist. Of course the land itself should be put to the best use. As already mentioned, it is used as sites for all kinds of commercial enterprises, and is open to improvements such as the construction of railroads, wagon roads, trails, canals, reservoirs, and telephone and power lines. All kinds of development work are benefited by National Forests, because they make sure, so far as can be, that timber and wood are kept on hand ready for use instead of being burned up or shipped out of the country, and that the flow of water is kept even and steady for power and other purposes. The conservation (which means simply the wise use) of all the various resources of the Forests, especially of the water, means a great gain in dollars and cents to many commercial enterprises, the water-power companies in particular. The protection of the forest at the heads of streams means a prosperous life to such companies, for it assures them a steady and clear flow of water. The destruction or misuse of the Forest means failure, for it carries with it flood, silt, and drought. Here, again, it is considered that valuable rights which belong to all the people and are protected at Government expense should not be given away free of charge when they are sought for commercial use. It would seem doubly unwise to do this when the corporations which are benefited show a tendency to form great monopolies. So a reasonable charge is made for the value received. The charge is not made for the water, but for the conservation of the water.

Playgrounds.—Quite incidentally, also, the National Forests serve a good purpose as great playgrounds for the people. They are used more or less every year by campers, hunters, fishermen, and thousands of pleasure seekers from the near-by towns. They are great recreation grounds for a very large part of the people of the West, and their value in this respect is well worth considering.

Game.—The Forest officers are often appointed as State and Territorial game wardens, to protect the game under State and Territorial laws. As a consequence game is usually more abundant and better looked after within the National Forests than outside of them. Although the services of Forest officers in this respect are wholly incidental to their other work, because they are acting for the States and Territories and not as Federal officials, much good has been accomplished, and the arrangement has met with general approval. The people want the game preserved. In many cases it means a good money return to the locality concerned.