FOREST SERVICE. 373 



Of free special-use permits there were issued durino; the 3'ear 

 2,986 — practically the same number as the year before. The number 

 of such permits in effect at the close of the year was 6,989, as against 

 5,540 one year previously. 



EXECUTIVE FORCE. 



The following table shows the classification of the Forest force, in- 

 cluding field men tcmporaril}" assigned to District odices, on June 30, 

 1910: 



Supervisors 140 



Deputy supervisors 106 



Rangers 1, 293 



Guards 558 



Forest assistants 97 



Field assistants, timber and mining experts, engineers, hunters, 



etc 156 



Clerks 186 



Total 2,536 



It will be seen that the transfer of the greater part of the executive 

 work and responsibility connected with the National Forests to the 

 Forests themselves, which has been going on graduall}' for the past 

 three years, has been largely accomj)lished, dince only 18 per cent 

 of the entire enrollment (3,091) of the Forest Service are engaged in 

 administrative, executive, scientific, and the requisite clerical work 

 in localities other than on the National Forests. 



All the National Forests in the continental United States and 

 Alaska, embracing a total of 192,865,247 acres, were under ad- 

 ministration at the close of the year. The number of rangei-s and 

 guards was 293 more than for the preceding year, reducing the aver- 

 age area to each such officer from 125,065 acres to 104,307 acres, or 

 approximately 103 square miles. This reduced amount of territory 

 (obvioush' still much too great) per man, was more than offset 

 by the constantly enlarging demands due to increasing use of the For- 

 ests. So small a protective force is in the highest degree uneconomical. 

 It ex])osos the vast supplies of National Forest timber to an umiec- 

 essary peril, while at times when, through drought and other un- 

 avoidable natural causes, the Forests are attacked by serious fires, 

 heavy emergency expenditures must be made to put out conflagra- 

 tions which ought never to have gathered headway. The peril of 

 los^ by such fires is not confined to public pioperty. 



Because of the increasing responsibihties imposed upon rangers as 

 overseers of work and as agents of tho Government in dealing with 

 users, the civil-service examination for assistant forest ranger held 

 in October, 1909, was strengthened by requiring a rating on general 

 education as well as experience. The minimum entrance salary ])aid 

 assistant forest rangers was raised January 1, 1910, from $900 to 

 $1,100 per annum, making tlie pay more commensurate with the 

 quality of service expected. A reai.ljustment to this minimum of the 

 salaries of men already in the Service did much to lessen the danger 

 of failing to attract and hold, in competition with the fields of outside 

 employment, the best type of men. For similar reasons, the minimum 

 entrance salary paid technically trained foresters was raised on July 

 1, 1910, from $1,000 to $1,200 per annum. 



