2i ;s 



in these counties had diminished from 10 to 20 per cent, within less than 20 

 years, ;md lei-tile lidds had been covered up for more tlian 100 miles from the 

 sourer .,!' the soil, with the debris brought from the mountains by the rushing 

 torrents. 



The French Government has expended for reforestation of these mountains, 

 during the l;ist thirty years, over $35,000,000 and expects to have to spend more 

 than tlie same amount in addition before the damage is repaired. The result of 

 this work, some of which is now long enough established to show effect, perfectly 

 justifies the anticipations of its efficiency. In the " perimeters" which have been 

 recuperated the waters are carried off more slowly and without damage. These 

 works in their result must quiet all theoretical discussion of the efficiency of forest 

 cover in this particular. They present ocular proof not only of the fact that de- 

 forestation invites fioods, erosion, and untold damage, but that reforestation is the 

 method of remedying the damage and proper attention in time to the forest cover 

 the method of obviating it. 



Recognizing the value, then, which a forest may have in preserving proper 

 water conditions and soil conditions, and perhaps, too, in some degree in climatic 

 conditions, the conception in Europe of " protective forests" as distinguished from 

 the " economic forest," that is, a forest which has value only from a material point 

 of view, a policy has grown up in the higher developed nations of placing the 

 first class of forests, which have a significance as a natural condition rather than 

 as a source of material supply for the whole community, under government control, 

 direct or indirect. 



(6) Aside, therefore, from ike undesirability of destroying or unnecessarily 

 impairing a valuable resource of material, which can be continuously repro- 

 duced on land otherwise useless, there is strong reason ^vhy, especially in regions 

 dependent upon irrigation for their agricultural development, favorable forest 

 conditions should be carefully maintained. 



Modern experience and scientific research have confirmed the experience of 

 antiquity, namely, that plant production is primarily dependent upon water 

 and that the management of water supplies is much more essential to the farmer 

 even in the humid regions, than management of mineral constituents of the soil, 

 for the latter can be supplied with ease, but the former can be regulated and sup- 

 plied properly only with difficulty. If, then, water management becomes more 

 and more important in all sections of our country, it is particularly so in those 

 regions where, from natural causes, the supply is scanty. No artificial reservoirs 

 can supply the more easily and cheaply maintained natural reservoir of the forest 

 floor. 



In this connection it will be well to quote the following language from a 

 memorial recently transmitted to the President of the United States by the Colo- 

 rado State Forestry Association, to which the Secretary of State, State engineer, 

 State treasurer, attorney-general, and other leading officers of the State, together 

 with the chambers of commerce of Denver and Colorado Springs, and some 500 

 leading citizens of the State have appended their signatures, recommending the 

 reservation of all the timber lands in their State. 



To his Excellency the President of the United States: 



Your memorialist, the Colorado State Forestry Association, respectfully represents that the 

 agriculture of this State, now rapidly increasing in magnitude and importance, is almost entirely 

 dependent upon systems of irrigation. At least $13,000,000 are invested here in reservoirs, 

 canals, ditches, and other works for the storage and distribution of water. No less than 13,000 

 miles of irrigating canals and main ditches are in operation or in course of construction m the 

 State. 



