ing $3,000,000 a year, is such a steep. proposition. It will look even less 

 when it is reflected that something must be done to make recreation of 

 the forest a really practicable undertaking. 



MOST FOR PROTECTION. 



J. Girvin Peters, of the United Slates forest service, he who has 

 charge of co-operation with the states, says: 



"It is significant that many states whose forest work was begun 

 mainly along experimental lines are now giving the larger part of their 

 time and t'heir appropriation for forestry to fire protection." 



More money for the fire fighters to work with is not the only thing 

 needed they need sme changes in these laws. Nothing radical ap- 

 pears to be desired. Nobody is advocating divorcement of the state 

 fire warden's office from the state game warden's office. There are too 

 rnny good arguments for keeping them together. The administrative 

 work is much th same, the territory is t'he same, and the ultimate 

 aim is the same conservation of the state's resources and building 

 them up. Game. protection involves forest protection; the only wonder 

 is that the game protectors do not seem to realize how necessary are 

 forests to game interests. 



NEED BETTER LAWS. 



There are laws in some states requiring every timber owner to 

 provide a patrol system satisfactory to the state authorities. Other- 

 wise the state provides it and taxes the owner for it. Michigan's two 

 private co-operative forest protection organizations, one in the Upper 

 and one in t'he Lower Peninsula, are not as active, of recent years, as 

 formerly. 



Slash disposal laws are better defined and more effective in some 

 states than in Michigan. In this state, while the forest fire protec- 

 tion law provides that the state fire warden and his men "may enter 

 upon lands and remove or destroy brush, and other dangerous com- 

 bustible material wherever necessary," there is nowhere in the vast 

 fire area perceptible any systematic purpose or effort to reduce the 

 fire hazard at this, its starting point. It appears t'hat the "may" of 

 the statute might well be made to read "shall." 



Laws penalizing careless and malicious setting of fires that spread 

 and cause great damage may be adequate enough, as statutes, but they 

 are not enforced with anywhere near the vigor that the game laws 

 are enforced. The records of prosecutions stand easily 10 to 1 in 

 favor of the game laws. 



STILL WASTE TIMBER. 



Harvesting of timber goes on in this state. The cut approximates 

 1,000,000 feet of hardwood a year, and 100,000 acres are being added 

 every year to the millions o.f acres of cut-over lands. And one hears 

 all through the North tales of shiftless practices by lumbermen that 

 rival tales of the older days tops and branches left lying, in quite the 

 fashion that the old-timers created the burnt-over slash lands all over 

 the North Country. Some states have laws regulating the cutting of 

 timber on private lands, and it appears on t'he face of it that if Michi- 

 gen were to put up $550,000 or anything like that for fire protection, 

 laws to make the slash makers take more care than they do would be 

 well justified. 



There are other legal matters to be considered, as well as the tax 

 laws. One at least of which operates with the force of-a law of nature 

 to discourage th attempts f private owners to re-grow forests; but 





