Report of the State Forester. 



By ALBERT DICKENS, 

 Professor of Horticulture and Forestry, and State Forester. 



THE forestry work that has been done in central and western 

 Kansas in the past quarter century has resulted in a large num- 

 ber of good tree plantations, many poor ones, some total fail- 

 ures and as might be expected a great variety of opinions con- 

 cerning the possibility of growing forest trees in the various 

 soils and situations found in the state. Theories, opinions and 

 notions are easily manufactured. Frequently more ardor is 

 exhibited in defending a notion than in securing facts, but the 

 lessons that are valuable for the present and future settlers on 

 the plains of Kansas must be drawn from facts. 



Explanations concerning the treelessness of Kansas prairies 

 have been plentiful, varying from the effects of wind and sun 

 to the presence in the soil of substances and organisms which 

 are fatal to tree growth, but any explanation that in any degree 

 explains must give large measure of importance to the effects 

 of fire. 



Early settlers remember the story of an old Indian who was 

 the last of his tribe to leave the head- waters of the creeks now 

 known as the Kiowas, how they attempted to discourage winter 

 visits of northern tribes by burning the prairies north of the 

 Arkansas. The deer and buffalo would desert the burned 

 tracts and the roving Indian would find no pasture for his war 

 horse or pack pony. Other years his northern neighbors 

 reached the river with a friendly north wind and then the fire 

 raged to the creeks of the Cimarron watershed. And all the 

 time the fire was the factor that kept the timber growth from 

 encroaching upon the domain of the prairie. In central and 

 western Kansas, the natural timber is restricted to very nar- 

 row belts along the streams. 



Wherever the banks were sufficiently broken to check the 

 fires, timber grew. Numerous examples of this might be 

 given, taken from many localities. A striking example is fur- 

 nished by Cedar Bluffs, in southern Trego county. The Smoky 

 Hill river runs along the foot of the bluffs, cutting very close 

 to the rocky ledge at each point of a crescent, the points being 



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