Conditions in the Peace River District* 



Interesting Letter from a Vice-President of the Association. 



For a good many years Mr. Francis D. 

 Wilson has been the territorial Vice-Pre- 

 sident of the Canadian Forestry Associa- 

 tion for the territory of Mackenzie. Mr. 

 Wilson was the representative of the Hud- 

 son's Bay Co., at Fort Vermilion. In 

 replying to the letter of the Secretary 

 notifying him of his re-election and in- 

 quiring about forestry work in the district, 

 Mr. Wilson writes tendering his resigna- 

 tion owing to the fact that he is being 

 moved by the company to Moose Factory, 

 James Bay District. This does not mean 

 that Mr. Wilson has lost interest in for- 

 estry, and he promises to write for the 

 Association an account of forest condi- 

 tions near his new post. Accompanying 

 his letter Mr. Wilson sent some notes of 

 conditions in the Lower Peace River 

 Valley, which are published below. It 

 should be noted that postal facilities in 

 that part of the Dominion are very poor. 

 Mr. Wilson's letter is dated May 20, so 

 that it was dispatched before the Domin- 

 ion Forestry Branch began any work in 

 that district this season. It should also 

 be noted that Mr. Wilson's reason for 

 thinking it will not be necessary to lay 

 out forest reserves in that district, is that 

 the land now covered by forests is wholly 

 unfit for agriculture. However, with the 

 advent of the inexperienced settler, and 

 still more of the 'fake' settler, it will 

 probably be just as well to have these 

 marked out as forest reserves as early as 

 possible. — Ed. 



There is very little settlement go- 

 ing on in the lower part of the Peace 

 River, the settlers at Fort Vermilion 



are, with two or three exceptions, re- 

 tired servants of the Hudson's Bay 

 Co., or their descendants. Peace River 

 Crossing, Grande Prairie and the up- 

 per Peace River are attracting all the 

 incoming settlers at present, and any 

 settlement going on here at present is 

 not adversely affecting the forests. 

 We have had a period of four or five 

 very dry years, and last summer and 

 the summer before there were a num- 

 ber of forest fires that destroyed a 

 quantity of spruce timber. It is dif- 

 ficult to suggest an adequate system 

 of fire protection, the distances are so 

 great and the country wholly unset- 

 tled between Peace River Crossing 

 and Chipewyan (a distance of 557 

 miles) with the exception of the Fort 

 Vermilion settlement which is situat- 

 ed about halfway between these two 

 points. 



There is a Sergeant of the R. N. W. 

 M. Police stationed here. If he had 

 one or two Constables with him they 

 could render effective service for at 

 least six months of the year, which 

 are the danger months, by a system 

 of patrol on the Peace River. They 

 could meet a patrol from Peace River 

 Crossing the first part of the month 

 and return to Vermilion and go down 



Skidway of Logs on Peace Slver. 

 131 



