no 



AMERICAN FORESTRY 



instruments, Mr. Moore states his con- 

 clusions with a great flourish of lan- 

 guage — but withholds his records. 



Mr. Moore presents ten lofty con- 

 clusions. The first four are to the ef- 

 fect that forests do not cause or in- 

 crease rainfall. Probably not — nobody 

 has said that they do ; this conclusion 

 was reached by other investigators a 

 good while ago. 



In his fifth conclusion it is asserted 

 that floods are caused by excessive pre- 

 cipitation — a fact which we have, in- 

 deed, believed from our youth up. But 

 he also adds that spring floods, occur- 

 ring from the melting of large quan- 

 tities of snow, are worse in the forest 

 than in the open. Not so. Colonel 

 Chittenden made the same claim last 

 year arnd presented records to prove it, 

 but his records were found incorrect 

 and his claims utterly refuted. 



Mr. Moore's sixth conclusion is that 

 the effects of soil-erosion have been 

 exaggerated and that "erosion is not al- 

 ways an unmixed evil." People of the 

 South have but to weigh this state- 

 ment in the scales of their own expe- 

 rience to know how wanting it is. Who 

 will speak up for the benefits of soil- 

 erosion? Certainly not the owners of 

 once fertile low lands, or of present 

 gullied fields and hillsides, or the power 

 companies whose ponds are rapidly fill- 

 ing up ! 



Conclusion seven is that the moun- 

 tainous parts of the water-sheds are so 

 small that their run-off would not be 

 sufficient to cause floods even if defor- 

 estation allowed a greater and quicker 

 run-off. What a statement ! Is there 

 a man who knows one single mountain 

 tributary of an Appalachian stream 

 who cannot, from his own experience, 

 disprove absolutely that statement? 



Conclusions eight, nine, and ten are 

 to the effect that the removal of forests 

 from water-sheds does not tend to in- 

 tensify floods and low waters. This is 

 the important point, and it is here that 

 Mr. Moore is farthest afield. The rec- 

 ords of his own bureau disprove his 

 assertions. His own words are : "Floods 

 are not of greater frequency and longer 



duration than formerly." Disproved by 

 the Monongahela, disproved by the 

 Cumberland, disproved by the Tennes- 

 see, the Alabama, the Savannah, the 

 Potomac, the Wateree, and the Con- 

 garee. Disproved absolutely by every 

 southern Appalachian stream whose 

 water-shed has in considerable part 

 been deforested by cutting and fire. 



The records for these streams, taken 

 from the Weather Bureau, are pub- 

 lished by the Geological Survey and 

 the Forest Service, and are available 

 to all who desire to see for them- 

 selves. Mr. M. O. Leighton, Chief 

 Hydrographer of the Geological Sur- 

 vey, made a most thorough and critical 

 examination of the records of the 

 Weather Bureau for several southern 

 Appalachian streams, among them the 

 Ohio, the Allegheny, the Savannah, 

 the Wateree, and the Alabama, and 

 reached the conclusion that, to use his 

 own words, "A broad and compre- 

 hensive review of river-discharge rec- 

 ords in the United States indicates un- 

 mistakably that floods are increasing. 

 It is true that the opposite tendency 

 may be shown on some rivers, while 

 the records for others indicate little or 

 no change ; but, taken as a whole, the 

 rivers that reveal more intense flood 

 tendencies so thoroughly dominate the 

 situation that the conclusions above ex- 

 pressed must be inevitable." 



The Forest Service studied the rec- 

 ords from a larger number of streams 

 than the Geological Survey and found 

 "that in many of the streams in the Ap- 

 palachain Mountains there had been a 

 steady increase in the number and dura- 

 tion of floods during the past twenty 

 or thirty years," and that the increase 

 is greatest in the streams where the 

 most forest has been destroyed and 

 least on the streams where forest con- 

 ditions have been least changed. 



If this is "false reasoning" or "mis- 

 taken enthusiasm," let competent au- 

 thorities judge on the records as they 

 stand, not as they may be presented for 

 the perfectly apparent purpose of sup- 

 plying ammunition against forest con- 

 servation in general and against the 

 Appalachian project in particular. 



