964 SHEEP INDUSTRY OF THE UNITED STATES 



killing a great number of bears in the aggregate during the year." He 

 thinks it is "a pity that such good-natured animals, which are so much 

 a part of these shaggy wilds, should be exterminated."* Against this 

 pity for bears may be set the evidence elicited in a lawsuit brought 

 primarily to test the question of injury done by sheep grazing in the 

 mountains. The suit was against a county for demanding a license for 

 sheep passing out of one county into another, for purposes of summer 

 grazing on mountain lands owned by the flock-owners. This is one of 

 thelaws of California, inimical to sheep industry, which is to-day helping 

 to raise the price of dressed mutton to 11 cents per pound, where once 

 it abounded at 2J to 3J cents per pound. 



The following extract from a letter by a member of the sheep-breeding 

 and wool-growing firm of Kirkpatrick & Whitacre supplies informa- 

 tion on this point from business experience and personal observation, 

 which is supported by every one of very many communications re-? 

 ceived : 



We have had our sheep in the mountains for many years, and our Mr. Whitacre 

 has been with them every summer and can give you all the facts from personal ob- 

 servation. Some two years ago we had litigation with the county of Tuolumne on 

 the license issue, and had subpoenaed about a dozen of the most prominent sheep- 

 men now in this part of the State. The county had all the cattlemen there that 

 could be reached, and the question of forest fires was thoroughly ventilated. 



It was shown that the principal range for sheep was above the timber line, that 

 what feed there was in the timber belt that sheep would eat was "deer brush," 

 "bull brush," and other shrubs that never grow into trees ; that they did not eat 

 the young pines; and that it would kill them if they did. Furthermore, it did 

 great damage to the mountain range to be burnt over and that every owner of 

 sheep was very solicitous in urging caution on his herders to prevent fires. That 

 they were caused mostly by camping tourists and Indians who set fires to drive 

 game out of the brush. 



Three years ago we had on the forks of the Stanislaus one of the greatest fires 

 ever known in the mountains. It was burning for weeks. The next summer I was 

 all over our range on the middle fork of the Stanislaus, and did not see one tree that 

 had been killed by the fire. A good many dead trees had been consumed and the 

 underbrush had been burned out, but I do not think one green tree had been injured. 

 The fire destroyed all our corrals, cabins, fences, etc., doing us damage to the extent 

 of hundreds of dollars, besides burning the range. If you have been in the moun- 

 tains that are timbered you will know that the ground is covered with the fallen 

 leaves of pine and fir to a considerable depth. When a fire runs overthis the leaves 

 of course burn, and every green thing that sheep might nibble at is consumed. The 

 whole surface of the ground seems to burn, leaving nothing but abed of ashes, which 

 produces almost nothing for years afterward. 



Another charge is made, that when the brush is destroyed by the sheep the sun 

 melts the snows sooner and were it not for this the waters would be held back later 

 in the season for irrigating purposes. But the facts are, that the spring floods occur 

 now just as they did and at the same time as before any sheep \\ ere taken to the 

 mountains. The timber belt with the underbrush that sheep feed on is so low down 

 that the snows are melted by the warm sun of May and June, and the streams are 

 fed in the latter months by the snows that lie in altitudes higher than the timber 

 belt. Beyond a doubt it is to the interest of sheepmen going to the mountains to 



See Century Magazine, November, 1891, p. 90. 



