BEARING OF THE PROPOSED APPALA^ 



CHIAN FOREST RESERVE ON 



NAVIGATION 



By W J McGEE, LL.D,, Expert, Bureau of Soils, Department of Agriculture 

 (Secretary U, S. Inland Waterways Commission) 



THE States whose rivers will be di- 

 rectly influenced by the Appa- 

 lachian Forest Reserve when es- 

 tablished are Alabama, Georgia, Ken- 

 tucky, Mississippi, North Carolina, 

 South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, 

 and West Virginia, with northern Flor- 

 ida. Their area is 400,000 square miles. 

 The rivers comprise the principal tribu- 

 taries of the Ohio, including the Cum- 

 berland and Tennessee ; the Mobile sys- 

 tem, including especially the Alabama 

 and Tom Bigbee, with their leading af- 

 fluents ; the Appalachicola system, of 

 which the chief members is the Shap- 

 pahooche ; the Ocmulgee, Altamaha, 

 and Ogechee systems ; the Savannah 

 and Coosawhatchie, Edistow, Santee, 

 and Pee Dee systems ; the Cape Fear, 

 with some of its affluents, the Noose, 

 Tar, and Roanoke, with connected 

 waters ; the James and Rappahannock ; 

 together with the great bordering riv- 

 ers, especially the Mississippi and Ohio, 

 which extend the influence into all the 

 adjacent states. 



The mean annual precipitation with- 

 in the states directly influenced by the 

 Appalachian forests is about fifty 

 inches ; the total quantity per year is 

 about 45,000,000,000,000 cubic feet. 

 This boon from the skies is the chief 

 value of the region ; it controls produc- 

 tion ; it determines the value of form 

 lands ; it fixes sites of towns and facto- 

 ries ; it forms ways for water traffic and 

 governs other lines of commerce. 

 Without it the region would be a bare 

 and uninhabitable desert; with it the 

 far-reaching hills and dales have made 



homes for 20,000,000 sturdy and inde- 

 pendent people, and are capable of sus- 

 taining many times that number. 



Of the 45,000,000,000,000 cubic feet 

 of water annually distilled from the 

 clouds, perhaps a half is returned to the 

 air through evaporation; this tempers 

 the atmosphere and acts as a blanket 

 retaining the warmth of the day 

 throughout the night ; a part of it forms 

 dew which sustains vegetation, while a 

 larger part drifts away to maintain 

 that atmospheric condition and circu- 

 lation on which the habitability of the 

 region depends no less than the direct 

 precipitaton. About a quarter of the 

 aggregate rainfall is absorbed by the 

 earth or consumed in chemic changes, 

 chiefly connected with growing plants. 

 The remaining quarter gathers into 

 streams, of which the larger are navi- 

 gable; and all parts of each river sys- 

 tem from its sources in the forest-clad 

 Appalachian ranges to its mouth are 

 interdependent of the 10,000,000,000,- 

 000 or 12,000,000,000,000 cubic feet of 

 water annually flowing from this 

 greater Appalachian region into the sea. 

 More than half flows through navigable 

 channels — it forms the sole and entire 

 basis of interstate and intrastate water- 

 way commerce throughout what may 

 be called the waterway states ; and it 

 virtually controls the interstate com- 

 merce on the bordering rivers — the 

 Ohio and the Mississippi. Many prim- 

 itive peoples worshiped rivers and im- 

 puted to them supernatural attributes ; 

 even within our own times some regard 

 them as mysterious in their movements 



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