FOREWORD 



The movement for the conservation of natural resources is new in 

 America it has always been row in a young country. In the older 

 countries it is considered the duty of the government to control the 

 utilization of those natural resources upon which is based the pros- 

 perity of the nation no one questions this right. Yet, even in 

 America at the height of her national prosperity, thinking people 

 are astounded at the waste of national wealth ; the soil is washing out 

 to the sea. destroying navigation and water power; the forests are 

 being recklessly exploited or destroyed by fire ; mineral wealth is 

 utilized as though it were limitless. Certain of our natural resources, 

 once gone, can never be replaced; others, again, may be reproduced. 

 Tn fact, natural resources may be divided into two distinct classes, 

 those restorable and those nonrestorable. For instance, soil fertility 

 is a restorable resource, since it may be renewed through better meth- 

 ods of farming, but soil itself is a nonrestorable resource, since ages 

 are required for the disintegration of rock in the formation of new 

 soil. Coal, oil and the metals are nonrestorable, since the total amount 

 is limited and science has not yet discovered a means of creating a 

 new store. Forests, on the other hand, are restorable, so long as the 

 soil retains its ability to grow trees. Indeed, forests not only produce 

 a material very necessary in the arts, but prevent erosion, increase the 

 fertility of the surface soil and ameliorate extremes of climate. If one 

 thinks of the different natural resources in relation to this classifica- 

 tion, it is easy to decide which resources should be husbanded and 

 made to last as long as possible, and which should be placed, under 

 management and utilized so as to increase the production. Farm 

 management results in increased yields of grain and meat; forest 

 management results in increased yields of lumber, paper pulp, tur- 

 pentine and all the various byproducts of distillation. The greater 

 the intensity of management, the richer the returns will be. 



Conservation means "wise use," not non-use. Applied to the soil 

 it means a management which will yield the greatest returns possible, 

 compatible with maintaining and increasing the productive capacity 

 of the soil, whether it be in agriculture, forestry or as health resorts 

 for the people. Instead of exploiting the soil, conservation demands 

 a management of the soil as though it were an investment yielding an 

 ever increasing annual return. The science of agriculture is another 

 name for conservation of the soil. Applied to the forest, conservation 

 means the careful use of what timber we have, the production of more 

 timber on land not adapted to agriculture, and the maintaining of a 

 permanent supply of wood for those industries dependent upon this 

 class of raw-products. 



Conservation of natural resources and permanent prosperity go 

 hand in hand they are inseparably linked. It has been said that the 

 United States will draw its supply of raw products from other coun- 

 tries when her own are exhausted, but these people forget that there 

 is already a big drain upon all countries possessing great natural 



