THE FORESTS OF ALASKA 



37 



The continuance of the National Forests is necessary 

 to secure adequate fire protection. I have already 

 explained the danger of fire on the National Forests and 

 how this problem is being handled. I have explained 

 the great destruction in the forests on the public domain 

 which are not under forest administration. The abol- 

 ishment of the National Forests means the removal of 

 the only organized forest protection that is being under- 

 taken in Alaska today. The abolishment of the National 

 Forests would invite destruction to all those portions of 

 the forests which are subject to an annual fire hazard 

 and serious damage to a large portion of the balance. 



The abolishment of the National Forests would quickly 

 put a stop to Government sales of timber such as are 

 now being made and such as are anticipated in larger 

 volume in the near future. Such sales would be stopped 

 because the best timber would be privately acquired. 

 Unbroken logging units would be a thing of the past. 

 Private owners would quickly seize the strategic sawmill 

 sites and permit operations only on such terms as they 

 pleased to dictate. The orderly handling of the public 

 timber in the public interest would no longer be possible. 

 Under public ownership, the settler, the miner, and the 

 industrial organization needing timber can secure it 

 promptly and on reasonable terms, and they are assured 

 of a continued supply protected from the exactions of 

 holding concerns. 



Adequate forest protection, the perpetuation of the 

 forest resources at the same time with their full utiliza- 

 tion, the protection of all the users of the forest resources 

 fully insuring supplies to them at reasonable rates, and 

 the making of other resources available for use side by 

 side with the utilization and development of the timber 

 are the particular public benefits which accrue from 

 public forest administration. 



GROWING FROM THE ROCK 



MANY a traveler has saved himself from being 

 dashed down a precipitate cliff or steep 

 mountain side through the aid of some bush 

 or tree, whose tough roots were entwined among the rock 

 crevices. Throughout the entire Rocky Mountain area 

 the tourist or the hunter from the East is struck with 

 the marvelous capacity of the native trees for not only 

 obtaining a foothold, but indeed making a vigorous and 

 sturdy growth where there seems to be nothing whatever 

 in fact but rock. Here and there may appear cracks in 

 the solid rock of the mountain side holding a little coarse, 

 dry, rocky dirt with about enough nourishment, one 

 would think, to sustain a plant the size of a violet, or per- 

 haps a tiny bush. Yet one frequently finds really large 

 trees growing in just such places. On every hand may 

 be practically solid granite, yet trees will grow out of it, 

 and the most the observer can find are comparatively small 

 cracks into which the roots disappear, completely filling 

 them and even conforming to their shape. How the tree 



Photo by Gilbert, U. S. Geological Survey. 



WHERE DOES IT GET SUSTENANCE? 



How large trees can grow out of almost solid rock is a question which 

 the traveler in the Rocky Mountains and the California Sierra con- 

 stantly asks himself. In many cases there is also a dry season of 

 months duration with which the tree has to contend. 



shown in the photograph, which is growing out of an 

 apparently solid mountain of granitic rock at King's Can- 

 yon, California, can get enough of either water or plant 

 food is a puzzle for which close examination offers only 

 partial solution. 



COLORING IN REDWOOD CONES 



By O. E. Jennings 



I WOULD like to call attention to the rich coloring 

 matter contained in the cones of the California red- 

 wood. 

 While preparing for the herbarium of the Carnegie 

 Museum at Pittsburgh some specimens of the redwood 

 which were collected near the Muir Woods early in Sep- 

 tember, 1915, the twigs, with cones and leaves attached, 

 were sprayed with a weak solution of bichloride of 

 mercury in denatured alcohol, to which a small quantity 

 of glycerine had been added. Upon the application of 

 the solution to the cones the surplus liquid running out 

 upon the sheets from them was noticed to be of a bril- 

 liant magenta-red color. A small quantity of the fluid 

 was drained or into a bottle and now appears to be a 

 rather transparent rich magenta in color. 



This not has been written with the thought that pos- 

 sibly this coloring matter may not have been noticed 

 before and that possibly it might be of some economic 

 value. So far as I have been able to learn from the 

 literature examined, it has not been listed among the 

 organic dye-stuffs. 



