380 



FORESTRY AND IRRIGATION 



An trust 



maximum violence. Private timber- 

 land owners assume a hopeless attitude 

 toward the fire question, rarely mak- 

 ing systematic effort to protect even 

 their own property. The effect of the 

 repeated fires in reducing the forest's 

 productive capacity and destroying its 

 water-conserving powers does not 

 need elucidation here. The annual 

 loss to the state from this source de- 

 serves the most serious thought. The 

 water question is mightily influenced 



those elsewhere, or that there is here 

 the slightest intention of taking sides 

 with the sentimental forest enthusiast 

 who brands all lumbermen as vandals. 

 Since California is on the upward 

 wave of forestry progress it is unwise, 

 however, to overlook the influence 

 which the private owner exerts. His 

 methods of management are natural 

 and logical. He has to deal with a 

 purely business proposition, which 

 will continue as such. The hope of 





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Forest Land which has reverted to Chaparral, and the Chaparral in turn burned to an 

 extent which destroys its value as a watershed cover 



by the management of private timber- 

 lands, through the effect which the 

 fires and chaparral which follow log- 

 ging have on the water-retaining 

 capacity of forested drainage basins. 

 Whether or not the general climatic 

 conditions are changed is an unsett'ed 

 <|ur--.tion, on which scientists usually 

 take the negative and laymen the af- 

 firmative side. 



It must not be inferred thnt private 

 owners of timberland in Califonr'a 

 are any different or anv worse trr.n 



forestry is that it, too, is based on 

 business principles which, with the 

 changing economic conditions, can be 

 successfully applied to lumbering 

 operations. The application of the 

 more fundamental principles of prac- 

 tical forestry on private timberlands 

 in California will ward off the menace 

 to the water, agricultural, and timber 

 interests which threatens if present 

 methods are continued. 



Compared with other regions and 

 ether states the attitude of the Cali- 



