1900. 



AMERICAN FORESTRY ASSOCIATION. 



Rivers to an elevation of 2900 feet, as at 

 Newberry, Cal., on the A. & P. railroad, 

 Santa Fe Route, where there was at one 

 time a large grove which was cut down to 

 supply fuel for the silver mines in Calico, 

 when our laws permitted miners to indulge 

 in the luxury of mining silver ore. So far 

 as known, no effort has been made by 

 our experimental stations to grow this 

 valuable cattle food and fuel-producing 

 tree. The pods of this tree have a taste 

 similar to sweet corn and seem to ripen at 

 almost all seasons of the year, and fur- 

 nish food in the Arizona and California 

 desert valley sections for the Indians as 

 well as for cattle and horses. 



"The presence of excessive alkali does 

 not apparently kill the tree, and it seems 

 to flourish where there would grow noth- 

 ing else that cattle would subsist on and 

 get fat. Professor Wickson, of Berkeley, 



is authority for the statement that the Date 

 Palm will subsist on moist alkali soil, and 

 that salt is the proper fertilizer for this 

 tree. If this statement is true there are 

 large areas in the desert where the alkali 

 and salt water and moist land are found, 

 and where experimental trials could be 

 made with these two representatives of 

 native and foreign desert trees. To in- 

 crease the areas of forests would make 

 such sections fit for habitation, and open 

 up settlements in the districts where min- 

 erals could be made available. The ad- 

 dition of any valuable tree from the in- 

 terior or inland sections of Australia might 

 have as good results to our desert sections 

 as the introduction of the Eucalyptus family 

 has been to the coast districts of Cali- 

 fornia." 



O. S. BREESE. 

 Los Angeles, Cal. 



A Proposed National Arboretum. 



Offer of Three Thousand Acres of Land in California Suitable for an 



Economic Plant Station. 



The study of botany has come to be 

 universally recognized as of great value 

 to a nation, and botanical gardens are sup- 

 ported by nearly every country in the 

 world. It is peculiarly appropriate, at a 

 time when the City of Los Angeles is 

 offering to the Department of Agriculture 

 a magnificent tract of land of over three 

 thousand acres in extent, suitable in every 

 respect for the establishment of a national 

 arboretum, that the matter should be dis- 

 cussed, and the advisability of such action 

 demonstrated. 



It is hard, perhaps, for the residents of 

 Eastern States to realize of what vital im- 

 portance the preservation of our forests is 

 to the farmers and dwellers in this south- 

 west region of America. Each winter 

 day the sky and rain conditions are care- 

 fully observed, and perhaps nothing will 

 so impress the eastern tourist as the uni- 



versal thankfulness and contentment 

 brought about by a hard day's rainfall. 



It is, therefore, no wonder that Los 

 Angeles, the largest city in the Southwest, 

 has become the center of forest work and 

 interest the question so vital to the pros- 

 perity of our city the preservation of 

 the winter rainfall for use during our long, 

 dry summers by protecting the forest cover 

 of our mountains and foothills, and the 

 replanting of areas devastated by fire has 

 become a problem of absorbing interest, 

 not only to our farmers and scientific 

 bodies, but to the departments at Wash- 

 ington. Skilled agents are now investi- 

 gating these peculiar conditions, but the 

 question car! never be satisfactorily an- 

 swered until practical trial is made of trees 

 and shrubs growing under similar climatic 

 conditions. 



Other countries of the world Algeria 



