154 



AMERICAN FORESTRY 



AGRICULTURAL VALLEY BOTTOM IN THE MOUNTAINS 



It ii Ihc Detriment's policy lo make available for settlement all lands which are chiefly valuable for farming. Those not chiefly valuable for 



agriculture are retained in public ownership. 



utilized to build up the country. They furnish the tim- 

 ber required by settlers, communities, and industries 

 within and near their borders. More than half of the 

 timber now cut annually is used in the vicinity of the 

 Forests. This includes all that taken free and under 

 sales at cost, and approximately 45 per cent of the 

 commercial cut. Hundreds of mining districts through- 

 out the West, from small projects requiring an occa- 

 sional wagonload of props or lagging to the great copper 

 district of central Montana, which consumes about 380,000 

 pieces of mining timber annually, are supplied. Rail- 

 roads also are furnished a large part of the ties and 

 other material required for their lines in the Rocky 

 Mountain regions. A million and a half ties now are 

 cut from the Forests yearly. Throughout the West tim- 



RANGF.H COL'NTING and marking railroad ties on a 



TIMBER SALE 

 . railroad! in the Rocky Mountain region with a large 

 material required fot their lines. 



her is taken from them for nearby towns, irrigation pro- 

 jects, hydroelectric power plants, and the like, while 

 thousands of individual settlers obtain it for fuel and 

 farm improvements. On the Alaskan coast the salmon 

 packers, towns, and settlers use 40,000,000 feet a year 

 from the Chugach and Tongass Forests. 



The National Forests also meet the demands of the 

 general lumber market. More than ;500, 000,000 feet are 

 cut annually for the nation-wide trade. Since 1!I08 there 

 have been taken from them 5,000,000,000 board feet of 

 wood and timber products. 



Not only is timber amply supplied and future re- 

 sources safeguarded, but the ultimate damage to the 

 West through impairment of its water resources, vitally 

 important for irrigation and other purposes, also is pre- 

 vented. The damage would 

 have been of a kind to force 

 at a huge cost the undertaking 

 of protective works against 

 erosion, torrent formation, and 

 floods. Other countries have 

 been compelled to do this. At 

 the time the National Forest 

 policy was entered upon the 

 agencies making for destruc- 

 tion were actively at work. A 

 range overgrazed and forest 

 fires which burned unchecked 

 were diminishing the water- 

 storage value of the mountains 

 and accelerating soil destruc- 

 tion and removal. The evils 

 averted and the benefits secured 

 through only a decade of pro- 

 tection and regulated use con- 

 stitute a gain of great mo- 

 ment. 



NATIONAL FOREST 

 part of the ties and other 



