DESTRUCTION OF THE FORESTS 

 Fire in a Rocky Mountain Forest, Rosebud County, Montana 



No ; we are not alone in the desire 

 to save our forests, utilize our waters, 

 and waterways and conserve our soils 

 and minerals. We are of a distin- 

 ijuished company, that embraces the 

 thinking nations of the world. The 

 cult of conservation is by no means 

 wholly American ; it is altogether cos- 

 mopolitan. And there is even a dan- 

 ger that we, as a people, may perhaps 

 lag behind some of those other nations 

 that we have believed to be far less pro- 

 gressive and practical than our own. 



&' &' 5^ 

 Forest Fires 



AS THE summer advances the re- 

 ■^*' ports of disastrous forests fires be- 

 come more frequent. From northwest, 

 west, southwest, north, east and all di- 

 rections, the reports of conflagrations 

 come, until it would seem as if our 

 timber supply, only estimated at suffi- 

 cient for half a century or so, could not 

 now last over a score of years. 



The newspapers were full, a short 

 time ago, of reports of the tremendous 

 loss of standing timber caused by the 

 498 



great forest fires in Alberta an'l north- 

 western Canada. Several towns, it 

 was reported, have been wiped out; 

 hundreds of square miles of forest and 

 range lands were burned over ; many 

 lives were lost, and the property loss 

 caused by the fire, according to con- 

 servative estimates, will amount to 

 $5,000,000, or more. 



In Montana — in the Helena Na- 

 tional Forest — another disastrous fire 

 occurred during the early part of Au- 

 gust. Reports in the papers stated 

 that this fire was caused by lightning, 

 and lightning was also the cause of 

 fires in the Sierra National Forest. 

 Small fires are reported from other 

 parts of the country ; and, as a whole, 

 the months of July and August have 

 been disastrous as regards destructive 

 fires in the forests. 



In the case of the great Canadian 

 fire, carelessness seems to have been 

 the principal cause of the tremendous 

 loss. The fire had been smoldering in 

 the brush for days, never seeming to 

 threaten any great blaze, and not being 

 considered threatening enough to re- 

 quire attention. Finally, however, the 

 wind shifted; a heavy gale set in, 



