242 Forestry Quarterly 



patch up the existing system, is then increased, especially if 

 available appropriations are inadequate. 



In placing a forest under administration, of course, the first 

 important job is the forest inventory, the making of a record 

 as to stock and plant on hand. An important and readily com- 

 pleted portion of the general inventory will cover the improve- 

 ments. For each item of construction now in place, a map and 

 written record should be prepared. These records will include, 

 besides improvements proper, practically all of the forms of 

 uses and occupancy existing on the forest, since nearly all uses 

 and occupancies involve improvements of some kind. Among the 

 principal items to be investigated and recorded will be : Ranger 

 stations and suitable station sites, with the improvements on 

 each and the possibilities of agricultural and other development, 

 roads, trails, telephone lines, bridges, cabins and other buildings, 

 camps and camp sites, navigable streams and known fords, look- 

 out points and their equipment and points of supply. The con- 

 nection of all interior routes of transportation and communica- 

 tion with those outside the forest area should be investigated and 

 recorded. 



Where construction, such as telephone and telegraph lines, 

 flumes, irrigation ditches, stores and other buildings, etc., is found 

 to be present, the procedure will properly be the prompt deter- 

 mination of the rights and equities under which they may be 

 present on the forest land and the taking of immediate steps 

 to terminate or validate the occupancy, by removal, trespass 

 action or permit. Great care is necessary here to insure that pre- 

 sumptive rights are not allowed to grow up and that the rights 

 of the forest owner are fully acknowledged by the users. Special 

 care should be taken in the cases involving rights of way and 

 other easements in order to prevent the monopoly of important 

 road or trail sites and the possibility of their being closed to 

 traffic. 



When this early work is caught up, the forester will begin the 

 consideration of the data available with a view to the preparation 

 of his Improvement Plan, which will probably be one of the first 

 sections of the Working Plan to be completed. Before he can 

 progress far with the formal Plan, it will be necessary for him 

 to secure a great amount of detailed and dependable information 



