364 



Canadian Forestry Journal, Scplcinbcr, 1919 



TESTS PROVE FOREST'S EFFECT ON STREAMS 



Experience has proved that the forest works 

 efficaciously against many dangers resulting 

 from the elements let loose such as avalanches, 

 falls of stones, erosion, earthslides, inundations. 

 These are facts admitted and indisputable, but 

 ho wand in what measure does the forest ex- 

 ercise this moderating action upon the de- 

 structive power of water? How can it lessen the 

 destruction from inundations? 



It is in order to attempt an answer to this 

 leading question that the Swiss Federal Station 

 of Forest Research in 1900 installed an ob- 

 serving station in the basin from which two 

 streams of the Bernese Emmental are fed. These 

 streams tributaries of the Hornbach, are located 

 in the territory of the commune of Sumiswald- 

 Wasen, on the northwest slope of the Napf. The 

 Geological formation is fissured pudding-stone 

 which decomposes readily. One of the basins, 

 with an extent of 140 acres, is completely wood- 

 ed. The other with an area of 1 75 acres has 

 only a small average of wooded district about 

 30 per cent. The forest is composed of spruce 

 and of alder bushes. The measurement of the 

 preciiptation, rain and snow, takes place regu- 

 larly throughout the year. In each of the 

 basins there have been installed three rain gauge 

 stations at different altitudes. At the junction 



of the two streams with the Mornbach certain 

 apparatus registers automatically every five 

 mmutes, day and night, the volume of the water 

 flowmg. 



The research station is going to publish very 

 soon the results thus obtained from these valu- 

 able observations. In the meantime if we refer 

 to the provisional statements of the research 

 station the two following points seems to have 

 been definitely established: 



1. In case of storms accompanied with heavy 

 rains the maximum outflow in the wooded valley 

 IS from 30 to 50 per cent less than that from 

 the other valley, and there is another beneficial 

 circumstance from the action of the forest, that 

 this maximum flow is produced later in the 

 wooded basin than in the other. 



2. In the long periods of drought (the sum- 

 mers of 1904, 1908 and 191 1) the wooded dis- 

 trict gave without interruption a flow of water 

 while in the denuded valley the stream dried 

 up and all the springs ceased although at a 

 normal time they have an abundant flow. 



These observations seem thus to have de- 

 monstrated irrefutably the moderative action of 

 the forest upon the regulation of the stream, flow 

 which some have denied. 



PLEA FOR THE NORTHERN ONTARIO HOMESTEAD 



Geological Survey, 



Ottawa, July 25, 1919. 



Editor, Forestry Journal, — I have just re- 

 turned from the newly opened territory in Nor- 

 thern Ontario, where farms are in the earliest 

 stages of the making. What most forcibly 

 strikes one there is the unnecessary desolateness 

 and discouraging ugliness of the majority of 

 these beginnings at homesteads. It is enough 

 to take the heart out of any prospective settler 

 before he has well begun, let alone those im- 

 migrants from towns, cities and the garden-like 

 areas of older settlements. 



The first thing that seems to be done is to 

 burn off everything clean, and then set the 

 site of the future home in the middle of the 

 burnt waste as far as possible from every grate- 

 ful shade from summer sun or shelter from 

 winter wind. In course of time, without doubt. 



scorched brule will be replaced by smiling fields 

 and gracious pasture, and shrubbery and shade 

 will be planted or spring up spontaneously in 

 the vicinity of the house, and things will gradu- 

 ally assume an attractive and more homelike 

 aspect — for another generation. But why wait 

 all these years in discouraging ugliness when a 

 little care in clearing and some thought as to 

 the situation of the home site will obviate it 

 almost entirely? The pioneer's life is hard at 

 best, why not do what can be done to ease it? 

 The first great demand of the pioneer in a 

 wooded country is cleared, arable land. The 

 fear of fire naturally almost amounts to an 

 obsession, and there is every reason for the 

 future farmer to put as broad a belt of clear- 

 ing as possible between his buildings, home and 

 livestock and the stubborn threatening forest. 

 But surely this does not necessitate the destruc- 



