LAND CLASSIFICATION 229 



Department of Agriculture — Cont'd. 



Weather Bureau. 



Biological Survey. 

 General Land Office. 

 Geological Survey. 

 Reclamation Service. 

 Bureau of the Census. 

 State Experiment Stations and other State institutions. 



The conclusions of the Committee read as follows : 



"Your committee considers the need of an agricultural classification 

 of land resources of the country from the standpoint of its economic 

 utilization as imperative. The resulting information when supplement- 

 ed by such field surveys as may be necessary would be of immediately 

 practical value in many ways, such as guiding the course of land settle- 

 ment ; determining the economically efficient size of farms in different 

 localities ; and in giving wise direction to the agricultural energies of 

 the country in the production of food and raw material. 



"This classification can be based, in part, on information which has 

 been gathered by various bureaus of this and other Departments, as 

 well as by State and private agencies. These data have, however, never 

 been assembled, correlated and appraised from the standpoint of econ- 

 omic utilization of land." 



considerations favoring classification of land for forfst 

 purpose:s 



The primary duty of any public forestry agency, with reference to 

 classification of any particular tract of land from an economic stand- 

 point, would obviously seem to be to make as clear and strong a brief 

 for forest occupation of part or all of the land in question as is possible 

 by showing what can be expected from timber growing and all the 

 advantages of having the particular piece of land in forest, regardless 

 of whether the land is agricultural, possible agricultural, or non-agri- 

 cultural. The agricultural and other points of view are amply taken 

 care of by other agencies. The forestry point of view will naturally 

 carry the greatest weight as applied to non-agricultural land, but this 

 does not lessen the importance of showing the advantage of having 

 forests on agricultural and possible agricultural land. In many cases 

 foresters show a tendency to accept too readily the thesis of the agri- 

 culturalist as to the comparative unimportance of forests as a form of 

 land utilization as compared to agricultural crops, which leads to an 

 exaggerated notion of the importance of growing the latter on all pos- 

 sible agricultural land. This agricultural viewpoint might well apply to 



