302 Division of Forestry. [Bull. 165 



One of the largest of the black walnut trees measures four feet 

 in diameter at five feet from the ground, and is fifty feet high. 

 Like most large trees in western Kansas, it exhibits the type 

 which is best fitted to survive under such conditions, short 

 trunk with a widespreading top which protects the stem and 

 the soil about it from the burning sun of summer. In one lo- 

 cality where the land adjoining Crooked creek has been pro- 

 tected from fire for a quarter century the timber is making 

 considerable headway in its contest with the prairie. 



Since the prairie fires have been restricted and the fuel need 

 of the settler supplied by the coal miner and freight car, the 

 area of natural timber has increased at a most gratifying rate. 

 Thirty years ago the Arkansas, west of Hutchinson, and its 

 tributaries from the south, were practically devoid of trees. 

 To-day there are many acres that are under forest conditions 

 and the forest area is increasing. Most of this growth is cot- 

 tonwood and willow, species that produce large quantities of 

 seed that is blown long distances and germinates very soon 

 after ripening. Species that produce heavier seeds are not so 

 readily distributed, and the time required for their distribu- 

 tion over a given area is very much greater. With Nature's 

 slow methods centuries of the most favorable conditions would 

 probably be required to extend the area of heavy-seeded species, 

 but as the forest area increases the forest inhabitants birds, 

 squirrels and other animals increase in numbers, and these 

 agents of distribution help, very slowly but surely, in the intro- 

 duction of other species. The increase of forest area in the 

 past has been confined for the most part to the alluvial soils of 

 the valleys ; soils easily changed from prairie to forest because 

 the soil is easily penetrated by roots and well adapted to nearly 

 any forms of plant life. 



Nature extends the forest back from the streams along ra- 

 vines and broken surfaces, and works from these back into the 

 upland prairie. The struggle for existence between prairie 

 and forest is a bitter one. The species is indeed fit to survive 

 that can compete for existence with the drought-enduring buf- 

 falo grass. But in the few localities where the buffalo grass 

 has been deprived of its allies, fire and cattle, the forest is 

 making progress. A few years' growth of buffalo grass accu- 

 mulates, the rainfall is held for a longer time by the mulch on 

 the soil, the buffalo grass itself grows stronger and roots 

 deeper, but its prosperity augurs defeat, for the bunch grass 



