8 IMPRESSIONS OF FRENCH FORESTRY 



owners who declined to reforest their lands were expropriated by the 

 State, with indemnities, but could reacquire their property within five 

 years after planting had been finished by reimbursing the Government 

 for all outlays expended upon it. Communal lands, under hke conditions, 

 were not condemned but were taken possession of by the State, to be 

 planted and held until revenues from the newly created forests had wiped 

 out the account. 



Under the obstacles created by hostile local sentiment and the reluc- 

 tance of the French Government to deal with it forcefully, this project has 

 made but slow progress. The law was changed in 1882 owing to the 

 opposition of the mountain communes to what they asserted, with some 

 degree of justice, was the practical confiscation of their lands without 

 indemnity; and since that time all areas where planting or other intensive 

 measures were needed have been acquired outright by the State. The 

 protection of mountain watersheds in France has thus taken a course 

 almost identical with that in the United States under the terms of the 

 Weeks law, that is, public acquisition and absolute control of important 

 "key" areas. The French Government has thus acquired about 200,000 

 acres on the headwaters of important streams in the Alps, and the work is 

 still being continued. In addition some 52,500 acres of communal lands 

 were reforested under the earlier law and placed under public adminis- 

 tration. 



Under the law of 1882 France has also attempted to enforce a new and 

 significant principle in watershed protection. This is the designation of 

 large protection belts in the mountains, surrounding the limited areas in 

 which serious erosion is actually taking place and must be combatted by 

 intensive methods. In these protective zones, which were designed to 

 prevent the starting of fresh torrents, the administration was empowered 

 to forbid any use of land or forest which would destroy the vegetative 

 cover. And to extend further the general scheme of prevention, the 

 grazing of certain communal pasture lands was placed under public con- 

 trol. The administrative procedure devised for carrying out this system 

 has been exceedingly cumbersome and has sought to conciliate local oppo- 

 sition at every turn with many provisions for safeguards and indemnities. 

 Its practical value has been very small, and the effort of the French 

 Forest Service to check mountain floods has of late years been concen- 

 trated mainly upon the acquisition of land at critical points by the State 

 and its systematic reforestation. 



The actual work done in the Alpine gorges and on their adjoining 

 slopes is an example of intensive conservation fully as striking as the 

 stabilization of the sand dunes. Tree planting is the primary method, 

 but it was necessary at many points to hold the soil or stop the cut- 

 ting action of streams before planting was possible or would be effective. 



