USES OF NATURAL AREAS 



33 



under growth. When such places are 

 all "cleaned up" the majority of the 

 winter birds and early spring migrants 

 disappear. 



8. GRAZING IN THE NATIONAL 

 FORESTS 



By O. F. Korstian 



The policy which governs the adminis- 

 tration of the National Forests includes 

 not only the insurance of a perpetual 

 supply of timber and the preservation 

 of a forest cover to regulate the flow 

 of streams, but also the development 

 of the other resources contained in the 

 Forests for the greatest permanent good 

 to the general public. Of all these the 

 production and harvesting of the timber 

 crop is the most important primary 

 purpose defined by Congress. The for- 

 age resource, however, is of such im- 

 portance in many parts of the West that 

 its development through regulated graz- 

 ing is one of the necessary functions of 

 administration of the National Forests. 

 Its extent is determined by the other 

 objects of administration. The general 

 policy therefore involves the develop- 

 ment of the grazing resource to the 

 extent compatible with that of the other 

 National Forest resources and with a 

 view to maximum production of meat 

 and other animal products and maximum 

 stabilization of the livestock industry. 



The grazing of livestock obviously 

 cannot be practiced without some modi- 

 fication of natural conditions. It may 

 either retard or promote the develop- 

 ment of the vegetative cover and cause 

 either retrogression or progression, but 

 in any case it tends to modify the types, 

 depending chiefly upon the closeness 

 with which the herbage is kept grazed 

 annually and upon the time of grazing. 

 In some instances unregulated grazing 

 has seriously interfered with the regener- 

 ation of the forests by consuming tree 

 reproduction along with the shrubby and 

 associated species. Continued grazing 

 of the range too early in the season or to 

 too great an extent not only favors 



degeneration of the cover and ultimately 

 the destruction of the vegetation, but 

 also tends to impair the fertility of the 

 soil by favoring erosion. These extreme 

 adverse modifications of natural con- 

 ditions, however, are the results of the 

 abuse of the range. 



Under scientific range management 

 these abuses will be practically elimi- 

 nated through the proper regulation of 

 grazing. The writer has reviewed else- 

 where* in some detail the consensus of 

 opinion of range management specialists 

 on the trend of grazing practice on the 

 National Forests in relation to the 

 preservation of natural conditions. The 

 composition of the herbaceous plant 

 associations will not, of course, be quite 

 the same as though no grazing had 

 occurred. The effects of grazing upon 

 plant succession depend not only on the 

 character and intensity of grazing, but 

 also upon the type of vegetation. Pro- 

 gressive succession is favored by the 

 system known as "deferred-and-rota- 

 tion" grazing; that is, the grazing of 

 parts of the depleted range only after 

 the maturity of the better forage and 

 the eventual extension of this practice 

 in rotation to all parts of the range. 

 This system is practiced in order to 

 maintain the ranges at their highest 

 producing capacity, as well as to revege- 

 tate the depleted ranges, since ordinar- 

 ily by its use more ready establishment 

 of valuable vegetation is secured than 

 by total protection from grazing. The 

 regulated grazing policy of the Forest 

 Service is to keep the areas in the climax 

 tj^pe of vegetation from the standpoint 

 of maximum meat production consistent 

 with the protection of watersheds and 

 timber reproduction. This may moan 

 occasionally a sub-climax ecological 

 stage of the shrubby and herbaceous 

 vegetation. Usually in the West, how- 

 ever, it will mean a climax ecological 

 stage of the shrubby and herbaceous 

 vegetation. This shouUl offer little or 

 no hindrance to the development of the 



1 Korstian, C. F. "GraziiiR pn\cticc on the 

 National Forests an.l its cfTeot on natural condi- 

 tions " Scientific Monthly, 13: 27a-2hl. 1921. 



