A NATIONAL PLAN FOR AMERICAN FORESTRY 547 



sible cash income from leasing. Much land formerly held by States 

 has been sold to any who would purchase, frequently to the highest 

 bidder at public auction. Two bad results have arisen from this 

 plan. In some cases the land has brought so little that it was 

 virtually a gift to the purchaser. In other cases because of the 

 anxiety of several stockmen, some of them transient, the price bid 

 was so high that it was never paid and the land after being badly 

 abused reverted to the State. 



Leasing for the largest obtainable cash return has meant in most 

 cases competitive bidding, whereby the previous lessee had no assur- 

 ance that he would have continued use of the land. In some States 

 there is provision for protecting the interests of the previous resident 

 lessee, although he may have to increase his rental to meet a higher 

 bid. Under great necessity to obtain a certain area, a stockman 

 might be forced to meet an unreasonable bid, perhaps by an alien 

 who bid very high in order to get a local foothold, often with the idea 

 of extending his grazing to other lands. There are seldom any pro- 

 visions as to how the range shall be grazed or any field supervision and 

 ordinarily the stockmen use it as they deem best. Lack of provision 

 for adequate management in disposal or lease makes for lack of assur- 

 ance of permanency, and in some cases State lands have deteriorated 

 until they correspond closely in condition with the unreserved public 

 domain. 



PRIVATE FOREST RANGE LANDS 



Nearly 42 million acres of privately owned forest land in the West 

 is grazed by livestock. More than 15 million acres of this area is in 

 farm woodlands, according to the 1930 census. The remainder is in 

 larger holdings mainly owned by stockmen, lumber companies, or 

 other corporations. Holdings of stockmen are chiefly in noncommer- 

 cial forest types. While the majority of private owners use their 

 forest ranges with the expectation of continuing grazing use, they fail 

 to appreciate what is happening to the range under the heavy use 

 commonly practiced. Little concern is given to the timber and other 

 resources. The major objective is maximum income. These ranges, 

 as a whole, have declined in grazing capacity to a condition almost 

 as bad as that on the public domain. There are of course individual 

 privately owned ranges that are well managed and on which forage, 

 timber, and watershed-protective conditions have been well main- 

 tained. Occasionally forest range lands owned by railroads and other 

 corporations are leased under definite stipulations as to the manner 

 and degree of use, but this is the exception. In the numerous cases 

 where such stipulations are not made the result is nearly always serious 

 depletion of the range. 



A considerable part of the private land within the national forests 

 is turned over to the Forest Service to be managed under the same 

 plans that apply to adjacent Government land. Such land is ordi- 

 narily kept in reasonably good condition. 



FOREST RANGES IN THE SOUTH 



The forests of the South furnish considerable feed for livestock, par- 

 ticularly for cattle during the spring and early summer. The region 

 here considered is identical with that presented in "Forest Land the 

 Basic Resource" section, and extends from Texas, Oklahoma, and 



