CHAPTER VIII. 



FOREST FIRES. 



This chapter deals with forest fires in general. In later 

 chapters under each region the particular fire problems of that 

 region are discussed at length. 



Kinds of Fires and Damage Done. 



American forests have suffered more from fires than those of 

 any other country and few regions have entirely escaped. The 

 character of these fires and the damage done by them depends 

 very largely upon the type of forest. It is only in coniferous 

 forests that fires assume immense proportions and become en- 

 tirely uncontrollable and for this reason Maine, with its rolHng 

 hills of spruce, has from its earliest history suffered more from 

 fires than most parts of New England. In these coniferous 

 forests, fires often sweep through the tops of the trees, and, driven 

 along by strong winds, advance over several miles of forest in a 

 day. These are called "crown fires." Most of the evergreen 

 trees are killed, but here and there a clump sometimes escapes. 

 The fire may jump from one side of a ravine to the other leaving 

 the trees in the bottom uninjured, and while the hardwoods 

 adjoining conifers are usually severely scorched, large areas of 

 these deciduous trees form an effective check to the spread of the 

 flames in the tops. 



The dry sand plains of Plymouth County, Massachusetts, have 

 been an incessant breeding ground for forest fires, as the cran- 

 berry growers of the region have, until recently, taken little care 

 for the forest. Fires burn over thousands of acres annually and 

 the result has been that the forest growth has continually de- 

 teriorated until it is of very little value. 



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