406 AMERICAN FORESTRY 



" 'The dry zone of Burma, and particularly Myingyan district, affords an 

 excellent example of the evil effects of erosion. The country has the appearance 

 of rolling landscape, the tops of the heights consisting of hard shallow soil 

 (the Kyatti Kon of the Burmese cultivator) which is incapable of producing 

 anything but the poorest crops of sessamum, cotton and jowar. The rainfall 

 is low, but heavy falls suddenly take place and the water which falls, having 

 no chance of being collected and held by humus, rushes down into the hollows, 

 carrying off the soil and breaking up the country by innumerable small water- 

 ways. So broken have these lands now become (not to mention that prac- 

 tically only the rock is left) that cultivation on a large and successful scale 

 is impossible. As a general rule, the eroded soil i.s not deposited at all, but 

 is swept by the smaller torrents into the large waterways,, where some damage 

 may be done to crops on the banks. Afterwards it reaches the Irrawaddy 

 and helps to form the sand-banks which imperil and impede navigation on 

 that river and in the long run finds its last resting place in the ocean. 'The 

 oceans are the burying ground of the continents' is one of the maxims of 

 the geologist, but the process can be lengthened and impeded by afforestation, 

 so that the loss to mankind is considerably lessened.' 



"The dry zone of Burma was formerly covered with forest which has now 

 for the most part disappeared. 



"In the Punjab much damage has been done by erosion caused by floods 

 following disforestation in the outer slopes of the Siwaliks and in the Pabbi 

 Hills. Enquiries made in connection with the Upper Jhelum Canal Works 

 have shown that many of the streams that run off the northern slopes of 

 the Pabbi range of hills, formerly covered with forests, but now bare, have 

 scoured out great ravines and channels and cut away much valuable land. 



"The case of the Hoshiarpur Chos is well known. Here owing to destruc- 

 tion of forest growth and excessive grazing, destructive torrents had formed, 

 and these carried vast deposits of boulders, silt and sand down on to the 

 fields below. These torrents put out of cultivation and rendered useless very 

 extensive areas of land. Following the example of France, a special act was 

 passed in 1900 providing for protective measures on the hillsides which 

 are now slowly being reafforested. The damage is already reported to be 

 diminishing. 



"In Bengal extensive denudation has taken place in Chota Nagpur and 

 Orissa, and the consequent damage by floods and erosion is becoming alarming. 

 A committee has been appointed to examine and report on the question, and 

 have come to the conclusion that the only way to stop the damage is to protect 

 the forests, and as in Hoshiarpur they recommend special legislation for this 

 purpose." 



THE WAGON WHEEL GAP EXPERIMENT STATION. 



Reference has already been made to the issue that was raised between the 

 Forest Service and the Weather Bureau when the Chief of the Weather 

 Bureau entered this discussion with his report on the influence of forests on 

 climate and on floods. A very sensible and useful way of harmonizing this 

 controver.sy has been reached through the establishment of an experiment 

 station in the Rio Grande national forest which is to be controlled jointly 

 by the Forest Service and the Weather Bureau, the object being to determine 

 tiie effect of forest cover upon high and low water stages of mountain streams, 

 the run-off of mountain watersheds as compared with annual precipitation 

 and the erosion of the surface of the watershed. A detailed description of 

 the station at Wagon Wheel Gap and the methods of the experiments pro- 

 posed was given by Mr. Carlos G. Bates in the last number of The Proceedings 

 of the Society of 'American Foresters. Necessarily these experiments will not 



