SAVE THE FORESTS. 



THE CLIMATIC EESULTS OF THE EXTENSIVE CUTTING AWAY OF 

 OUE FORESTS IN THE PROCESS OF CLEARING OUR FARMS. 



BY T. T. LYON. 



In approaching the consideration of this somewhat abstruse and complex sub- 

 ject, we may be excused for treating it not so much upon general principles as 

 in connection with the circumstances which may be assumed to affect the prob- 

 lem in our own lake-engirdled State. In so doing we may first glance at the 

 conditions existing prior to the advent of the white man, before whose march 

 the forests melt away, almost as if touched by the wand of a magician. 



The prevalent winds of our region are, as doubtless they ever have been, from 

 the southwest, coming down from the arid, central regions of the continent, shorn 

 of their moisture, and impressing upon the broad valleys of the Missouri and 

 the upper Mississippi many of the climatic peculiarities that so distinguish the 

 entire region, prominent among which, as we think may be reasonably assumed, 

 is its comparatively rainless and treeless character. Resting, as for a time they 

 do, upon the broad waters of Lake Michigan, and becoming in some degree 

 imbued with its moisture, how wonderfully is the scene changed as they reach 

 the shores of our peninsula. The same winds that for long ages have on the 

 western plains fanned the flames annually lighted by the red man, to open to 

 him the autumnal hunting grounds of Iowa, Illinois, and Wisconsin, by sweep- 

 ing away even the beginnings of forest growths, find their power for this pur- 

 pose so far quenched before reaching our shores they are no longer competent to 

 the task thus assigned them, but yield to the influence of the lake-given moist- 

 ure, which, in despite of autumn fires and summer drought, covers our State 

 with umbrageous forests. The effects of such covering are to check the radia- 

 tion of heat during clear, still weather, and in fact in a great measure prevent 

 it ; while at the same time evaporation of the surface moisture with the con- 

 stant and rapid elimination of heat in a latent condition, which would otherwise 

 occur, are greatly impeded by the checking of the velocity of the lower or sur- 

 face stratum of the wind. The importance of this check upon evaporation 

 from the soil will be the better understood and appreciated if we recall the fact 

 that, in the process of evaporating a given amount of water, an amount of heat 



