A NATIONAL PLAN FOR AMERICAN FORESTRY 855 



Pure stands of virgin shortleaf pine on poorer sites are occasionally 

 denuded by close cutting and fire. In general, however, this pine, 

 producing seed more abundantly and at shorter intervals than long- 

 leaf and growing in lighter stands which are less well adapted to the 

 profitable use of steam skidders, suffers little devastation. 



ON WESTERN SOFTWOOD AREAS 



In the great softwood-producing regions west of the Great Plains 

 in the Kocky Mountains and on the Pacific coast, it is estimated that 

 forest lands are being devastated at the rate of 191,000 acres annually. 

 The bulk of this acreage, more than 95 percent in fact, is in Idaho and 

 Montana, and in the Douglas fir forests west of the Cascades in Oregon 

 and Washington. Here as elsewhere in the country this condition is 

 brought about by fire and logging as the prime causes. While the 

 logging operation itself is seldom so destructive or complete as to 

 cause forest devastation, and tree stands of seed-bearing age are 

 seldom so destroyed by fire that a loggable crop cannot be produced 

 within a tree generation, fires in slash following logging, and in stands 

 of seedling and sapling age are particularly damaging. These fires, 

 and fires that burn the same area the second or third time, are re- 

 sponsible for most of the current devastation of forest lands. 



The cumulative effects of logging and fire in the Douglas fir region 

 are illustrated by the results of a study of areas cut over from 1920 to 

 1923. To determine the condition of the reproduction on these areas, 

 105 miles of transects were run in seven counties. Analysis of the 

 data indicates that about 40 percent of the area is nonstocked, 30 per- 

 cent poorly stocked, 15 percent medium stocked, and 15 percent well 

 stocked. It may be assumed that land being logged now and sub- 

 jected to the same combination of influences for an equal period will 

 be reduced to a similar condition. 



Much of the private land logged over for white pine in Idaho and 

 Montana has been burned after cutting. Unmerchantable species 

 and defective trees or trees below merchantable size left uncut are 

 prey to the first slash fire, w^hich kills much of this material. In a 

 few years these dead trees begin to fall and often create a fire hazard 

 comparable with the original slash. As a result, much cut-over white 

 pine land has burned a second time. The tangle of dead and down 

 trees, the snags still standing, the undergrowth of thistle, dry grass, 

 and fireweed altogether form so combustible a combination that it is 

 difficult, within reasonable limits of cost, to protect it from fire or to 

 stop a fire that has started in it. Probably 25 percent of the cut-over 

 land in the white-pine type in north Idaho is in nonproductive con- 

 dition because of fire. 



In the past few years, more strict enforcement of State fire and 

 slash disposal laws in Idaho and Montana, together with a growing 

 desire on the part of private operators to comply with these laws, have 

 greatly reduced the forest acreage devastated as a result of slash fires. 



The ponderosa pine types east of the ^ Cascades in Oregon and 

 Washington and the related types in California are less subject to 

 complete devastation by fire than the Douglas fir forests and the white 

 pine forests of Idaho and Montana. This is due to the uneven age 

 of these stands and their open character which permit the logging of 



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