628 JOURNAL OF FORESTRY 



Generally speaking, the climate of the Swiss watersheds may be 

 classed as moderately cold and rainy ; the climate of our Rocky 

 Mountains watersheds as very cold and dry; most of the precipitation 

 coming in the form of snow. The temperature of the control station 

 in Rappengraben is lower than that of Sperbelgraben. Precipitation 

 is practically the same in both basins, if anything, it is greater on 

 Rappengraben. Evaporation is probably greatest in Rappengraben on 

 account of its free exposure to the sun and winds. Thawing weather 

 occurs in winter in spite of the elevation. Fohn winds seldom occur. 

 The snow does not accumulate as in the Rocky Mountains of the 

 United States. 



The records of the discharge of the streams are available for the 

 open season April 16 to November 30 of each year. Our discharge 

 records cover the entire year. It appears that the automatic water 

 stage recorders at the Swiss station could not be made to function with 

 temperatures below freezing. It would seem, therefore, that the pub- 

 lished discharge values in per cent of the precipitation are too high. 

 Doubtless it was impracticable to make allowance for the ground water 

 in the watershed at the beginning of the open season. This view is 

 confirmed by computing the percentage of runoff for April. The 

 computed percentages from the data in Table 117 is, Sperbelgraben 

 103.2, Rappengraben 111.9. Occasionally the entries in this table for 

 certain months greatly exceed 100 per cent, thus Sperbelgraben, April, 

 1915, 258.4 per cent ; Rappengraben, April, 1915, 205.7 per cent. This 

 seems to show that a considerable part of the discharge as published 

 was due to precipitation which had occurred in March prior to the 

 beginning of streamflow records. 



The disposition of the precipitation is as follows : 



Sperbelgraben Rappengrabcv 



Per cent of precipitation Per cent of precipitation 

 Runoff 59.3 61.9 



Evaporation (vegetation) 14.5 11.8 



Evaporation (transpiration) 18.9 8.1 



Evaporation (earth) 7.3 18.2 



100.0 100.0 



In this connection the author remarks that "Since on the basis of 

 our investigations we have come to the conclusion that for mountain 

 districts of like form, like topography and climate, the yearly runofit" 

 from the forested and non-forested areas in our rainy lower Alps is 

 r:;proximately equally great, therefore, we may be permitted to assume 



