PROTECTION OF FORESTS FROM FIRE 267 



control. On large tracts without roads, ground-cleared 

 fire-lines may be used to protect areas of young growth, 

 or these may be developed at certain points to aid in the 

 control of broadcast burning. 



Annual burning for fire protection is never justified 

 where it cannot be systematically controlled. The prac- 

 tise in many parts of the South and West, of setting out 

 fires to burn off the litter and brush — usually for the sake 

 of a better range — cannot be justified, for the fires are 

 uncontrolled, and they destroy an immense amount of 

 young growth and otherwise damage the forest. Merely 

 setting fire to the woods without control is nothing less 

 than forest destruction. 



Fire-Lines. — Broadly speaking, a fire-line is a cleared 

 strip in the forest used as an aid in the protection from 

 fire. It may be a road, a trail, a river or stream, a line 

 cleared especially for a fire-break, or a plowed furrow. 

 The purpose of fire-lines is to check or stop fires, and to 

 facilitate fighting them. A small surface fire may be 

 stopped entirely by a road or even a path. Some surface 

 fires are easily checked in their progress by narrow fire- 

 lines; others can be stopped only by very wide lines. 

 Crown fires and surface fires of unusual severity will 

 readily leap across even very wide fire-lines. Fire-lines, 

 therefore, should not be built with the idea that they will 

 always stop fires. They are intended to serve primarily 

 as an aid, and often are an indispensable aid, in control- 

 ling fires and preventing their spread. Even when they 

 do not actually stop or check a fire thev serve as vantage 



