Maladjustments in Land Use 



31 



cleared land (for gardens, hardy fniif trees, and crops 

 of hay, oats, and other grains). ]>ivestock includes a 

 cow or two, a few hogs and chickens, and a work animal 

 or so. Such farms are usually incapable of supplying 

 family living even where eked out by hunting, fishing, 

 and woodcutting. Conseciuently, auxiliary employ- 

 ment in logging camps or mines or seasonal employ- 

 ment in iu>arby cities has been imi)erative. The clos- 

 ing of mines and the cessation of logging in many areas 

 has left these populations stranded. Between 1910 

 and 1980, from 5 to l.'j j)ercent of such farms were 

 abandoned. Since then public-relief demands have 

 been high. Except for through highways, roads are 

 poor and blocked with snow during winter. Schools 

 and churches are few and poor in (piality. Isolation 

 in most of these areas promotes pi-n\incialism and 

 retards all progress. 



Many of these mountain farms were occu|)ieil after 

 the Forest Homestead Act of 1906 threw open for use 

 many scattered tracts within the boundaries of na- 

 tional forests. Few if any of the settlements which 

 have resulted have provided the operators with an 

 adequate living or enabled them to pay for necessary 

 public services. Moreover, their existence within the 

 national forests probably increases the danger of timber 

 fires, and for this if for no other reason they might well 

 be eliminated. 



Fnnthill "Stump Ranches." — The typical farm of the 

 foothills is somewhat larger and more productive, but 

 rarely prosperous. Such units include perhaps an 

 average of 40 acres of crop land and arable pasture, 

 together with varying amounts of stump pasture. The 

 gross income per farmer is low, usually only a few 

 hundred dollars. The soil usually is poor and returns 

 so disparagingly small that even subsistence farming 

 cannot be regarded as permanent. The institutional 

 pattern is poor, and cost for maintenance of roads and 

 schools is very high. 



Some of these farms are located on desirable land, but 

 their acreage of cleared land is too low to jiermit ade- 

 quate income. Tlie expense and labor of clearing 

 additional acres is usually beyond tlic farmer's re- 

 sources, except through the gratuitous expenditure of 

 labor over many years. Some public aid in financing 

 additional land clearing would, therefore, seem to be 

 imperative. 



Farms in "Shoestrinfi" Vallei/s. — Several fairly large 

 valleys lead back Lnto the mountains of this region. 

 Usually these contain deep, fertile, residual, and 

 alluvial soil, and include a fair amount of generally 

 level land. Mountainous slopes, entirely unsuited for 

 agriculture, rise sharply from the valley floor. Many 

 such valleys are quite productive. They are often 

 many miles in length, but so narrow that the square 

 farm tracts overiaj) into the adjacent miniiitain slopes. 



As a result, they form long "shoestrmgs" of settlement 

 reaching far into the national-forest areas. 



AVliere these valleys lie along a transmontane route 

 they are accessible to markets and to the benefits of 

 tourist trade. On the other hand, where they end in 

 cul-de-sacs or blind-valley heads, as do the upper 

 Cowlitz River in Washington, the McKenzie in Oregon, 

 and the Mokehunne in California, their very attenua- 

 tion renders them remote from all possible nuirkets. 

 Only a few families can live in a valley of this kind and 

 remain self-supporting. In many instances, 10 or 15 

 miles of country road and one or more schools must be 

 provided for the benefit of but a few families. Fre- 

 quently these cost the taxpayers more than the total 

 value of production in the valley. In one case it was 

 found that the cost of providing a regular grade-school 

 education had reached a total of $250 per pu])il in con- 

 trast to the average of $80 for the county as a whole. 

 The roads up such a valley must be graveled at con- 

 siderable expense if they are to be passable dtiring the 

 whiter and s|)ring. It is clear, therefore, that the juain- 

 tenance of such communities is definitely imeconomical. 



The Western Great Plains 



The area commonly referred to as the (ireat Plains 

 extends from approximately the 9rtli meridian west- 

 ward to the Rocky Mountains. Over wide expanses 

 the surface is surprisingly flat, but it is locally marked 

 by considerable land relief. In central Montana the 

 general plauis character is broken by hilly and even 

 submoimtainous districts. Clunate varies from sub- 

 humid and semiarid to almost arid in places. The 

 region is in general treeless, and supports a natural 

 vegetation of short grass. 



Eajsteni Versus Western Great Plains. — The eastern 

 one-third of the Great Plains falls into the "blackerth" 

 or dark-colored chernozem zone. This tyj)e of soil is 

 unusually fertile. Ordmarily, rainfall deficiency is but 

 slight, and grain farming on an extensive scale has been 

 profitable. 



The western two-thirds of the (ireat Plains i)rcscnts a 

 quite different aspect. In jjlace of black chernozem 

 soil, this section is characterized in its eastern pai't by 

 chestnut-colored soils. Toward the west, this gives 

 way to brown soils and locally even to gray soils. 

 Most of these soils are also quite fertile, l)ut the rainfall 

 is both deficient and uncertain. 



As a result of general rainfall deficiency, great rain la II 

 variability, lower soil fertility, and locally rough 

 topography, the western part of the Great Plains is 

 quite generally a region of "problem agriculture." 



Settlement. — Agricultural occu])ancv of the Great 

 Plains began in central Kansas during the seventies 

 and in Nebraska and Oklahoma in the eighties. In 

 the Dakotas most of the laud has been i)ut under crops 



