6 PASTURE LANDS AND GRAZING CONTROL 



and the eastern part of Colorado, Wyoming, and Montana, com- 

 prises all the territory from the looth meridian west to the foot- 

 hills of the Rocky Mountains. In general, the Great Plains 

 region is comparatively level, with the northwestern part sloping 

 northward and the remainder inchning gently to the east. 

 Although dry farming is increasing in extent in many parts, and 

 irrigation agriculture is carried on in a limited way, the chief 

 industry is livestock production. Failure of cultivated crops is 

 not uncommon in this region, because of limited rainfall coupled 

 with high normal summer temperatures, low air humidity, the 

 prevalence of drying winds, and high evaporation. Except on 

 the eastern border of the Great Plains, the normal annual rainfall 

 averages less than 20 inches, with an annual variation from 11 

 to :^s inches. 



The adverse climatic conditions, sometimes causing com- 

 plete failure of agricultural crops, tend only to decrease, for the 

 time being, the yield of the hardy, well -adapted native vege- 

 tation, such as the buffalograss-gramagrass association (" short- 

 grass " type), three-awn grasses, needlegrasses, the muhlen- 

 ^/bergias, and sagebrush. The soil generally is rich and the 

 grazing excellent. In many localities the ranges are not fully 

 stocked, however, because of the distance between watering 

 places. The water, supplied as it is by relatively few streams, 

 is supplemented by drilled and dug wells, by artesian flows, and 

 by dams conveniently placed to catch and store the run-off from 

 torrential storms. The possibiHties of extending the use of the 

 forage crop in the Great Plains will depend largely upon the 

 extent to which water for hvestock purposes can be increased, 

 to a lesser degree upon improved methods of handhng the stock 

 on the range, and upon supplemental winter feeding. 



The Great Basin. — The term " Great Basin " applies to 

 that region lying between the Rocky Mountains and the Sierra 

 Nevada range which has no outlet to the sea. The region in- 

 cludes nearly the whole of Nevada and portions of Utah, Wy- 

 oming, Oregon, and California — a total area of approximately 

 217,000 square miles. In general, the Great Basin presents a 

 uniform appearance with respect to both topography and vege- 



