Forest Fires and their Prevextiox. 23 



Patrol is probably the most effective single means tliat the individual 

 can put into practice, though quite expensive. Efficient patrol will cost 

 from one to three cents per acre per year. Some companies, especially 

 in the mountainous part of the State, employ one or more men to look 

 after their forest land, and often part of their duty is patrolling. If 

 this were more generally practiced many fires would be prevented, and 

 many more extinguished before they had gotten beyond control. 



Warning notices, calling the attention of the passers-by to the danger 

 of forest fires, are used to a large extent in the National Forests of the 

 West, and are employed on many of the private or corporate holdings 

 in the l^orth and East, and to some extent in the South, though in this 

 State they are little used, except to include a prohibition against setting 

 fire to the woods in a general trespass notice. A carefully-worded re- 

 minder, posted where it will be seen and read, is calculated to help 

 materially in suppressing the ^'careless" fir'e.* 



Farmers can do much to prevent the disastrous, spring fires by burn- 

 ing in the winter as much as possible what brush and rubbish it is 

 necessary to remove in this way, and by never leaving even an innocent- 

 looking fire until it is quite out. Renters, who very often own no land 

 and are absolutely irresponsible, should be bound by a contract not to 

 set out fire in dry Aveather. If every renter who let fire escape and 

 burnt up his landlord's woods were in the future denied a place to rent in 

 that neighborhood, this class of offenders would learn to be more careful. 



A stipulation against setting fire to the woods should always be in- 

 cluded in a contract for the sale of timber. There is no more reason for 

 the purchaser of mature timber to destroy all the reproduction and 

 young growth on the ground by fire than there is for a man who buys 

 the apple crop to cut down and destroy an orchard in order to harvest 

 the fruit, and the sooner landowners realize this the better it will be for 

 their interests. 



co-operative associations. 



Co-operation between individuals for the purpose of fire protection 

 adds very much to the effectiveness of private efforts. The individual 

 suffers as much and sometimes more from fires that start beyond his 

 boundary than from those originating on his land; especially if he is 

 patrolling and his neighbor is not. Xo matter how careful a man may 

 be or how much he spends on fire protection, the fires that originate and 

 develop great headway before they come onto his property, can not be 

 controlled. Besides the attainment of efficiency through co-operation. 



•Fire lines, fire patrol and fire notices are more fully discussed in Economic Paper 19, "Forest Fires 

 North Carolina During 1909," pp. 43-47. 



