58 



THE FORESTER. 



March, 



at the headwaters of the South Fork of 

 the White River. The effect of this, was 

 quite serious, as the territory was densely 

 covered with spruce, pine and Balsam Fir, 

 which protected the snowholdings upon the 

 northern watershed. In the South Platte 

 Forest Reserve, many incipient conflagra- 

 tions were extinguished by the U. S. 

 rangers, the total forest area destroyed 

 here during the month amounting to only 

 twenty-five acres. On July 31st the U. 

 S. Supervisor of the White River Plateau 

 Reserve, discovered a large fire in the 

 Canon of Grizzly Creek. It had a big 

 start, and, the ground being very dry, the 

 flying sparks set several fires afar off. 

 The bed of Grizzly Creek being unap- 

 proachable (the cliffs on each side are 

 some two thousand feet in height), efforts 

 were made to cut off the course of the fire 

 toward the north, in which direction lay 

 a belt of magnificent spruce forest. By 

 back-firing and trenching the burning was 

 stopped after it had devastated about six 

 hundred acres in the reserve, two hundred 

 of which had green standing timber upon 

 them, the other four hundred acres being 

 covered with dead standing or dead down 

 trees. In the meantime the heavy w r inds 

 then prevailing cast brands over long dis- 

 tances into the Coffee Pot Springs woods, 

 where about four hundred acres were 

 burnt over, two hundred and fifty being 

 green timber and one hundred and fifty 

 acres grass land. With much labor this fire 

 was subdued, to the saving of the much 

 larger tract of spruce forest lying to the 

 northeast of Coffee Pot Springs. Sparks 

 were also blown into the deep canons and 

 heavily timbered gulches of Deep Creek, 

 resulting in the destruction of a hundred 

 acres of green standing and fifty acres of 

 dead timber. At the same time a blaze 

 came up over the cliff from the east side 

 of Grizzly Creek and burned over some 

 seventy-five acres of green standing trees, 

 not only destroying a beautiful piece of 

 Spruce forest, but also wasting the snow- 

 holdings which furnish the sources of 

 Broken Rib Creek. The Lake Creek fire 

 began August 1 6th in township 3 SR 87 

 West, igniting thirty acres of dead stand- 

 in- timber north and east of Lake Creek, 



besides some twenty acres of grass land. 

 It was stopped in its progress towards a 

 large body of green timber by trenching. 

 On the south and west the rangers pre- 

 vented its doing damage by back-firing. 



August 1 8th, a fire was discovered near 

 "The Caves," on the South Fork of the 

 White River in township 2 South Range 

 91 West, which ran over two hundred 

 acres of Oak brush, doing little or no real 

 injury to the forest, but threatening many 

 thousands of acres of green spruce, pine 

 and balsam timber upon the divide be- 

 tween the South Fork of the White and 

 Grand Rivers. It was extinguished by 

 rangers and the parties who had caused the 

 trouble by neglecting to put out their camp- 

 fires were placed under bond for appear- 

 ance before the United States Grand Jury. 



August 29th, ten acres of dead timber 

 burned over in township 2 SR 88 West. 

 This fire was put out by rangers who ap- 

 plied back-firing and carried water in can- 

 vass buckets, thereby saving five thousand 

 acres of splendid green timber on the 

 Trapper's Lake Trail. On the same day 

 another fire commenced in township 5 SR 

 90 West, near New Castle, extending into 

 township 4 SR 90 West, near Elk Creek, 

 destroying fifty acres of green standing 

 spruce trees. 



August 31st, a grass fire was discovered 

 at the mouth of Lost Creek in township 1 

 NR 90 West, which ran over a good deal 

 of bottom land. The rangers extinguished 

 it by back-firing and thus prevented it 

 from getting into a fine forest of Spruce 

 and Balsam at the headwaters of Lost 

 Creek. The month of August was full 

 of danger for the White River Reserve, 

 and it is owing to the faithful work of 

 Superintendent May and his men, that the 

 Reserve exists in its pristine beauty at the 

 present time. 



From August 16th, until well into Sep- 

 tember, forest fires were burning fiercely in 

 all directions upon the Black Mesa and 

 the Uncompahgre Plateau, practically de- 

 stroying all the timber growing: on the 

 divide between the Uncompahgre and San 

 Miguel Rivers. Efforts to extinguish 

 them were unavailing, the whole region 

 was swept bare of trees. 



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