454 



FORESTRY AND IRRIGATION 



October 



its experts to conduct such a study. 

 After the study is made the way is 

 clear for full formulation of the pol- 

 icy which will best serve the interests 

 of the state. 



The last resort, public opinion, the 

 intelligent interest of the citizens, is 

 the force which, if brought to bear, 

 will work the greatest good for the 

 forests of Kentucky. To inform and 

 strengthen this interest in forest prob- 

 lems every channel of information 

 should be opened. 



This campaign of education is 

 needed to secure certain definite, prac- 

 tical results. The essence of the mat- 

 ter lies in a nutshell. Over one-half 

 of Kentucky is wooded, and most of 

 this land can have no permanent value 

 except to produce wood, which the 



manufacturing interests of the State 

 cannot do without. 



The question is, shall much of the 

 State be permitted to become waste 

 and worse than waste land, untaxable, 

 stripped and abandoned and pouring 

 down ruin from its gullied and wash- 

 ing slopes, and shall much more pro- 

 duce only a scant and inferior yield 

 of material worth less for the wood- 

 working industries and hardly worth 

 cutting, or shall every acre of the com- 

 monwealth contribute its share to the 

 general welfare and its full profit to 

 the owner, yielding its present harvest 

 of mature timber without injury to 

 the younger growth, and intelligently 

 directed to the production in largest 

 possible quantity of the best paying 

 and most needed kinds of wood? 



THE DINKEY GROVE OF BIGTREES 



One of the Little Known Groves of Sequoias 



BY 

 JOHN D. GUTHRIE 



Forest Assistant, U. S. Forest Service. 



ONE of the smallest, most isolated, 

 and least " known of the ten 

 groves of big trees in the state of Cali- 

 fornia is the Dinkey Grove of Fresno 

 County. There is practically no pub- 

 lished information in regard to it be- 

 yond being included in a list of big- 

 tree groves in "A Short Account of 

 the Big trees of California," Bulletin 

 No. 28, of the Forest Service, with the 

 comment that very little reliable in- 

 formation was obtainable in regard to 

 it, and that it was said to have been 

 discovered by two hunters in the early 

 seventies. The grove has been given 

 the name of "McKinley Grove" by the 

 U. S. Geological Survey engineers 

 when they made a contour map of this 

 region a few years ago, but the grove 

 is still locally known as the Dinkey 

 Grove. 



The grove is located in Section 35, 

 Township 10, South, Range 26, East, 

 on a small stream emptying into Din- 



key Creek, a tributary of Kings River. 

 It is situated within the Sierra Forest 

 Reserve and is under Government 

 ownership. The grove, though small, 

 is the only one to be found between 

 the Fresno Grove in Madera County 

 and the Title River Grove in Tulare 

 County, and is the only Government- 

 owned grove between the Sequoia 

 National Park and the Mariposa 

 Grove, and the interest manifested in 

 it by residents throughout that region 

 is considerable. As an evidence of 

 this interest it may be said that during 

 the four days spent by the writer with- 

 in the grove it was visited by over thir- 

 ty persons, The grove may be reached 

 by the stage from the town of Fresno 

 to Ockenden post office. From here a 

 road leads to Dinkey Meadows, from 

 which point a good trail is found to 

 the grove. 



The grove is situated in a slight de- 

 pression, on a bench, on the south- 



*I1 lustrations through courtesy of U. S. Forest Service. 



