REPORT OF THE SECRETARY. 39 



the surveys and measurements made in the spring of the ])ast year 

 promise equally valuable results. 



The study of the effect of forests on climate and stream flow has 

 been continued in the Rio Grande National Forest, Colo., during 

 the past year, and complete data for nearly two years have now been 

 obtained. It was at first thought that this study, carried on at a 

 great elevation and in a supposedly semiarid region, would not afford 

 a basis for legitimate comparison with data obtained from the more 

 humid regions of the East, but it now appears that the final results 

 will permit of more general application than was earlier supposed. 

 Observations of a similar character, though more limited in scope, are 

 being made in other national forests in Minnesota, Idaho, Colorado, 

 Utah, Arizona, and California. 



OBSERVATIONS AND REPORTS. 



The observations and reports furnished by the 197 regular 

 Weather Bureau reporting stations of the first order form, in the 

 main, the basis for the weather maps and general daily weather in- 

 formation issued to the public. In addition to these, however, there 

 are 75 special meteorological stations that render telegraphic reports 

 and that are maintained as adjuncts to the work of the forecaster in 

 making special frost predictions for the fruit, truck, vineyard, and 

 cranberry interests of the various portions of the country. Of the 

 158,636 telegraphic observations due from these stations during the 

 year, only 1 was missed, and that through an accident to the observer. 



Of the special services devoted to the interests already mentioned, 

 that carried on in relation to the fruit industry has been given the 

 greatest extension during the year. These extensions have been made 

 largely in California, Oregon, Washington. Idaho, Utah, Colorado, 

 and North Carolina. In North Carolina numerous " orchard " 

 stations have been established, and a special investigation is being 

 made in the Blue Eidge Mountains in regard to the thermal belts 

 that are particularly favorable for the development of the fruit in- 

 dustry, owing to their practical immunity from damaging frosts. In 

 addition to the services already mentioned, observations were taken 

 at more than 400 special stations in the corn, wheat, cotton, sugar, 

 and rice growing States, and daily statements of temperature and 

 rainfall were issued during the growing season in the interest of the 

 staple crops produced in the districts covered by the reports. There 

 are also about 4,000 cooperative stations at which daily observations 

 of weather and temperature are made and from which monthly 

 reports are received by mail. These reports are of value in estab- 

 lishing the climatic conditions of the countr}'. 



The distribution of Weather Bureau forecasts and warnings has 

 been extended wherever practicable during the year, by means of the 



