TREE PLANTING NEEDED IN TEXAS. 11 



found along these roads and it is considered criminal to injure or de- 

 stroy them. We are beginning to consider the value of fine roadside 

 trees in Texas, and every effort should be made to stimulate an interest 

 in this phase of planting. 



WINDBREAKS AND SHELTERBELTS. 



Protection planting has a recognized value wherever crops, buildings, 

 soils or stock are exposed to unfavorable climatic conditions. In regions 

 of little rainfall windbreaks or shelterbelts, by reducing evaporation, 

 prevent loss of plant and soil moisture. In sections of Kansas, Ne- 

 braska, Iowa and other prairie States the windbreak is an important 

 part of the arrangement of crop areas on the farms. In Harvey county, 

 Kansas, there are 170 miles of osage orange rows. One township in 

 Platte county, Nebraska, contains 22 miles of rows, belts and groves 

 of windbreaks, mostly cottonwood. York county, Nebraska, has 40 miles 

 of windbreaks in one township, and Fairbault county, Minnesota, sup- 

 ports 400 acres of cottonwood and willow shelterbelts in one township. 

 In Oregon, Lombardy poplars are extensively planted for orchard wind- 

 breaks. In Texas, particularly on the plains of the western coun- 

 ties, practically the same conditions affecting agricultural opera- 

 tions are encountered as in the Middle Western States just men- 

 tioned. In this part of our State planting trees for protection pur- 

 poses is economically desirable. In the stock raising sections the value 

 of protection planting should be recognized. Shade in summer is an 

 asset to the beef grower. In winter stock- can be brought through in 

 better flesh on less feed if protected from the cold, biting winds. 



Many far-sighted farmers in our State are alive to these consider- 

 ations. In South Texas windbreaks have been planted in Willacy county 

 to protect citrus groves, and in Brooks, Aransas and Cameron counties 

 to protect diversified farm crops. In the Panhandle groves and rows 

 of trees have been planted in Ochiltree, Eoberts, Hemphill, Gray, 

 Swisher and doubtless many other counties to protect crops and soils 

 on the windswept plains. When the value of shelterbelts is more gen- 

 erally known, protection planting will become a definite part of the plan 

 of management on every well conducted prairie farm. 



INFLUENCES OF WINDBREAKS AND SHELTERBELTS. 



The injurious effects of air currents increase or decrease with their 

 velocity. Shelterbelts, by decreasing the velocity of air currents strik- 

 ing them, exert a beneficial influence over adjacent areas, the degree of 

 protection varying with the height and density of the windbreak. Height 

 determines the distance to which the protection is felt. Investigations 

 have shown that the protected area extends approximately five times 

 the height to windward and fifteen times the height to leeward of the 

 windbreak. Density controls the relative amounts of air which leak 

 through rather than are deflected upward and over the windbreak. 



During dry periods shelterbelts check the drying out of crop plants 

 themselves and by decreasing soil evaporation automatically increase 



