AMERICAN FORESTRY 



533 



SAYS THE BALTIMORE EVENING SUN 







Forest Protection Week, the National For- 

 est Fire Prevention Committee, is taking 

 advantage of the opportunity to call public 

 attention to the importance of the move- 

 ment for the preservation of the country's 

 forests. The menace of fire, which ac- 

 counts for an annual loss of $20,000,000 is 

 emphasized, and an appeal is made to the 

 individual to realize personal responsi- 

 bility in the effort to reduce it. One-eighth 

 of the value of trees thus destroyed is 

 charged up to pleasure seekers and partic- 

 ularly to careless smokers. 



Baltimore Evening Sun : Opportunities 

 are appearing almost every day for Ameri- 

 cans to prove whether they learned any- 

 thing from the war. In no smaller degree 

 does the opportunity exist to show whether 

 we have learned by experience in the mat- 

 ter of conserving our national resources. 



It is for the purpose of stimulating our 

 thought in this direction that the national 

 Government, in cooperation with the 

 States, designated Forestry Week. 



The wastefulness of the .\merican peo- 

 ple in respect to their forests would be 

 criminal if it were not so thoughtless. 

 During the war lumber was one of the es- 

 sentials. With the ordinary grades we did 

 not feel the pinch of necessity as we prob- 



in YEARS TO COME. 



Craig Fox Rochester Democrat- Chronicle. 



ably should twenty-five years from now. 

 at the rate at which we are wiping out 

 our timber resources and failing to replen- 

 ish them. But there was one type of lum- 

 ber which' we did need very badly dur- 

 ing the war spruce. The wood is essen- 

 tial in the manufacture of airplane propel- 

 ler blades. Due to the past wasteful 



methods of timber cutting and the laxity 

 of our precautions against forest fires, the 

 supply of this material was largely con- 

 fined to the two States of Washington and 

 Oregon. Surely it would seem now that we 

 should profit by the lesson and see to it 

 that the spruce forests of those States 

 are protected and spruce reserves else 

 where built up. But the forestry officials 

 tell us that the same wasteful methods 

 of cutting spruce are continuing. 



Such considerations are well worth pub- 

 lic attention, if Forestry Week is to mean 

 anything at all. Even if we did learn such 

 facts from our recent experiences, we have 

 still to prove our purpose to profit by 

 the lessons. 



WILL IT COME TO THIS? 



Donahey ill tlie Cleveland Plain Dealer. 



Rochester Democrat-Chronicle. .After 

 all, the inertia and the apathy are 

 the result of the lack of information. To 

 be sure this is not easy to excuse. There 

 is hardly a paper in the country which has 

 not been hammering the idea of forest con- 

 servation into the public consciousness for 

 years, to say nothing of the numerous and 

 efficient organizations for such work. But, 

 even if the ignorance is hardly excusable, 

 the fact remains that the public is lamen- 

 tably ignorant of forest needs. If this were 

 not so there would be such a clamor for 

 proper care of the dwindling timber sup- 

 ply that some deaf legislative ears would 

 suddenly find that they could hear. 



Washington Herald : By proclamation of 

 President Harding, this is Forest Protec- 

 tion Week, when not the fancy, but the 

 serious consideration of Americans is to 

 be turned, neither lightly nor sadly, but 

 constructively to the protection of our re- 

 maining forests, and the reclaiming by tree 

 planting, otherwise useless lands. We have 



wasted our forest substance like the pro- 

 verbially drunken sailor does his pay. 



Yakima (IVash.) Herald: Forest re- 

 sources in the east and south are at the 

 point where 61 per cent of our total stand 

 of saw timber lies west of the Great 

 Plains, and over 50 per cent in the three 

 Pacific coast states, according to the 



WHY CAMPERS SHOULD BE CARE- 

 FUL ABOUT FIRES. 



Perry ii 



I'nrtlaiul Orej^onian. 



.American Forestry Association of Wash- 

 ington, which is directing the campaign for 

 a national forest policy. 



Is it not high time we took steps along 

 the lines of the Snell forestry bill for for- 

 est protection? 



Billings (Mont.) Gazette: State forestry, 

 fortunately, seems to be on the eve of a 

 remarkable development. A survey con- 

 ducted by the American Forestry Associ- 

 ation, says that keen interest is being man- 

 ifested throughout the country in various 

 phases of forest legislation. Montana has 

 vast areas of timber, and should be as in- 

 terested as any state in the union in the 

 preservation and development of forests. 

 The American Forestry Association points 

 to the south where Texas is considering 

 the adoption of a comprehensive forest 

 policy with particular emphasis on fire 

 protection and reforestation, and the adop- 

 tion of a severance tax similar to that al- 

 ready in force in Louisiana. It is to be 

 hoped that the movement will bear fruit 

 in the enactment of a considerable num- 

 ber of progressive and effective forestry 

 measures. 



Newark Evening News: The report on 

 the subject of the adoption of a national 

 program of forest protection, recently sub- 

 mitted to the United States Senate by its 



