4 PASTURE LANDS AND GRAZING CONTROL 



PASTURE LANDS 



Range and Pasture Lands. — Of the various classes of public 

 lands, those at present used for grazing are by far the most 

 extensive. From the looth meridian west to the Pacific, in- 

 cluding the National Forests, Indian Reservations, and National 

 Parks, there remained in 1920 approximately 375.000,000 acres of 

 public domain. For this vast area one of the most important 

 economic uses is the grazing of livestock. It is not probable that 

 any considerable proportion of these grazing lands can be irri- 

 gated with the present supply of water; and, even if this were 

 possible, the cHmatic conditions do not, in most localities, favor 

 the production of farm crops. 



The total land area of the United States is 1,903,269,000 acres, 

 of which 878,789,000 acres is classed as " productive," but of 

 which only 293,794,000 acres, or 15.4 per cent of the total area, 

 is cultivated land.^ The remaining 584,995,000 acres of pro- 

 ductive land consists either of natural meadows and pastures, 

 or of forests or woodlots, or is otherwise unimproved. Prac- 

 tically 65 per cent of this unimproved land lies west of the 

 Mississippi River. The major part of the timbered lands has 

 been cut over, or else the stand of trees is so sparse as to sup- 

 port a more or less luxuriant, succulent, and nutritious under- 

 growth, the accessible portion of which is grazed annually. East 

 of the Mississippi, a large part of the 160,000,000 acres of un- 

 improved farm land remaining in 1920 is in woodlot, a consid- 

 erable proportion of which is not at present grazed, notwith- 

 standing the fact that these land produce an abundance of 

 palatable forage. Of the unimproved farm land of the entire 

 country, however, it is conservatively estimated that not less 

 than 350,000,000 acres are annually used for grazing purposes. 



All told, then, the acreage of land upon which our livestock is 

 grazed is considerably greater than that which may be classed 

 as improved farm property. The economic importance of the 

 grazing lands, as well as of the livestock industry, is apparent 

 from the figures given. The judicious utiUzation and man- 



* U. S. Dept. of Agr. Yearbook, 1920, p. 834. 



