Mar. 1910.] Conditions in Central and Western Kansas. 301 



The Arkansas and Cimarron rivers and their Kansas tribu- 

 taries flow for the greater part of their lengths through allu- 

 vial soils. There are few rocky ledges and few high banks, and 

 for the most part the prairie grass grows up to the very edge of 

 the low bank. Wherever banks or broken surface afford pro- 

 tection, trees were found. 



The need of the early settler for fuel was imperative. The 

 wood contract was necessary for the existence of the frontier 

 army post, and the few trees that might have produced seed 

 for extending the forest area of Kansas were cut to provide for 

 the soldier and settler. The vicinity of every army post has 

 the same story. Mulberry creek and Crooked creek provided 

 for Fort Dodge ; the Pawnee and Walnut creeks for . Fort 

 Larned. 



PLATE 3. Black walnut on Crooked creek, Meade county. 



At Fort Hays, the limits of the old reservation may be easily 

 noted by the trees which were preserved by the government. 

 The wood contracts were filled from the land outside the reser- 

 vation, and nearly every tree large enough to make fuel was 

 sacrificed to provide for the advance guard of civilization. 



A distance of forty-five miles seemed to mark the limit of 

 profitable wood contracts, and on Crooked creek, about that 

 distance southwest of Fort Dodge, some few of the big trees, 

 mostly hackberry and black walnut, are still standing. The 

 few that escaped the ax of the pioneer are those whose form 

 made them hard to work for fuel and difficult to split into posts. 



