ANNUAL REPORT 1913 5 



May 5th and was prosecuted vigorously throughout the remaind- 

 er of the season, during which time our entire territory was cov- 

 ered more thoroughly than ever before. Over 200 miles of 

 trails were cleaned out in this way and many curves were elim- 

 inated and grades reduced so that this work will be beneficial 

 for several years in contributing to the ease and dispatch with 

 which we can reach any part of our teritory in an emregency with 

 men, tools and supplies. 



TELEPHONE 



The entire private telephone system of the association was 

 thoroughly inspected and carefully repaired early in the season. 

 It w r as put in first-class condition and worked satisfactorily all 

 summer. 



Our telephone system has proved a very good investment 

 and one that has made for much greater efficiency. In the light 

 of our experience in this line the wisdom of using only first- 

 class equipment and of taking extraordinary pains in the installa- 

 tion has been fully demonstrated. A good telephone line is cheap 

 at any reasonable price in protecting our forests from fire. 



PATROLLING 



Owing to a fairly wet spring and the regularity and fre- 

 quency of showers during June and the first three weeks of July 

 it was not found necessary to do much patrolling^ until the latter 

 part of July .Our weather reports show that from June 1st to 

 July 19th we had a total precipitation of 3.57 inches, but the 

 last two weeks of this period show only 0.12 of an inch of rain, 

 so that about July 20th our regular patrol force was thrown out 

 and kept in the field until the end of the fire season. 



FIRES 



Our first fire of any importance occurred on July 18th and 

 the last on August llth. Of course there were innumerable 

 small fires which were so quickly discovered and controlled that 

 they were not deemed of enough importance to report. 



We had eight reported fires which burned over a total of a 

 little less than 70 acres mostly in cut-over land. Of the eight 

 fires reported two were caused by lightning, one by sparks from 

 a donkey engine, four; from old slashing fires breaking out and 

 one was of unknown origin. Xo timber or other property was 

 destroyed and but 13.000 feet of timber was fire killed. The lat- 

 ter has practically all been logged at this writing. 



Respectfully, 

 F. W. MALLORY, Chief Fire Warden. 



