A NATIONAL PLAN FOE AMERICAN FORESTRY 567 



remaining saw timber and one eighth of its cord wood-size timber. 

 There is evidence that by demonstration the national forests have 

 exerted a measurable influence beyond their own borders toward 

 the attainment by the Nation of the objectives sought in their own 

 creation 



securing favorable conditions of waterflows, and to furnish a continuous supply 

 of timber for the use and necessities of citizens of the United States. 



Though still facing many unsolved problems of protection and 

 administration, and needing more facilities for their full develop- 

 ment, present public support of the national forests proves that they 

 have demonstrated the soundness of both the principle of conserva- 

 tion through wise use, and the policy of coordinated use of all re- 

 sources to produce the largest net benefit. The public support is 

 not only for continuing this form of Federal participation in the 

 permanent management of the forest resources of the United States, 

 but also for the further extension of the national-forest system, 

 especially to the regions, mainly eastern, where Federal forest owner- 

 ship is now far below its portion of the public share in the Nation's 

 forestry enterprise. 



What are some of the tangible things which furnish a sort of meas- 

 ure of the contribution which the national forests have so far made 

 to the whole forestry development in the United States? For one 

 thing, the nearly one sixth of the Nation's commercial forest land 

 which is in the national forests is assured of permanent technical 

 management under the plan of coordinated use of the various re- 

 sources. Whereas, for the country as a whole, private timber is 

 being cut at a much faster rate than it is estimated to be growing, the 

 cut of national-forest timber is with rare exceptions fixed at or less 

 than the estimated growth capacity of each cutting unit, and it is 

 estimated that the total cut could be expanded nearly fivefold without 

 exceeding the total sustained yield capacity of the national forests. 

 The watersheds from which flow streams providing the domestic 

 water supply of 6 million people, and the water for over a billion 

 dollars worth of irrigation and power developments, are assured of 

 management designed to preserve the watershed values. The regu- 

 lated use of national-forest ranges has added materially to the sta- 

 bility of 25 percent of the range livestock industry in the West. The 

 recreational grounds of over 32 million people, measured by 1931 use, 

 are under management aimed at perpetuating and developing the 

 recreational resources. 



Seventy-five percent of the range used by big game animals in the 

 11 Western States is being given increasingly productive manage- 

 ment, and the game is steadily increasing. And fire protection on 

 the national forests has reduced the burned area so that for the 5- 

 year period ending in 1930 it was only 7 percent over the objective, 

 while on lands outside the national forests it was, for the same period, 

 11 times the objective. 



In the Rocky Mountain and Pacific Coast States, where 53 percent 

 of the commercial forest area and 42 percent of the saw-timber 

 volume is in the national forests, these Federal properties play an 

 important part in the forest economy of the region. Though the 

 timber cut on the national forests in this territory as a whole is still 

 only a fraction of the total cut of the region, established lumbering 



168342 33 -vol. 1 37 



