164 FOREST OUTINGS 



to, and dread of, the jungle. There is also the primitive excitement which 

 kindles in all of us the desire to see flame leap and run. Quite a few farmers 

 and woodsmen who ordinarily pass as sane, confess to letting a brush fire 

 get out of hand just to see if they can handle it afterward, just for the 

 excitement, just for ''the hell of it." 



Others argue that to burn off the brush and weeds is to increase the 

 game crop and the ease of the hunter in getting at it. Burning does make 

 the forest more open for hunters, but as for increasing game, that is doubtful. 



Any forest officer who has fought large fires can tell stories of deer, elk, 

 and bear, and smaller wild game burned to death in a sudden sweep of 

 flame, or limping pitifully around the edge of the fire with feet burned and 

 fur scorched. Such great conflagrations as the big Idaho fires of 1910, sweep- 

 ing 40 miles in a single day, must have wiped out practically all wildlife, 

 large and small, over entire river drainages. After such a fire every pool in 

 the streams is white with the upturned bellies of trout killed by ashes in 

 the water. 



"Fire," says Ira N. Gabrielson, Chief of the United States Biological 

 Survey, in a special fire prevention number issued by American Forests, 

 April 1939, "is not a temporary disaster. It burns the crop and it destroys 

 the ability of the land to produce another. 



"In 1937 a total of over 20,000,000 acres of wildlife habitat was blasted, 

 scorched, and sterilized by forest fires in the United States. The figure does 

 not include grass fires and marsh burns. If these fires killed only 1 bird or 

 animal to each acre, that would mean a loss of 20,000,000 living creatures 

 burned to death or suffocated in 1 year. But to obtain an estimate of the 

 total loss we must multiply that figure by the number of years that will 

 elapse before the habitat destroyed in 1937 has been restored and is ready 

 once more to produce maximum crops of wildlife. . . . 



"In all our plans for the conservative management of our lands for 

 wildlife, we must recognize the fact that whether kindled in ignorance or 

 maliciously or accidentally, forest fires and grass fires are deadly to wildlife." 



To BURN COVER Is To BURN GAME, is a slogan that forest education and 

 information workers have been considering in an appeal to the sporting 



