340 ECONOMICS OF FORESTRY. 



The ownership of the forest area will largely 

 determine how far such conservative treatment 

 may be expected. 



Governments, which are logically conservative 

 managers of their properties, own in the United 

 States as yet only an insignificant acreage. Thanks 

 to the forest reservation policy, inaugurated in 

 1 89 1, the federal government has reserved and 

 continues to reserve and exclude from sale or other 

 disposal some of the public domain, which still 

 comprises over 500,000,000 acres. 



It is uncertain how much of this acreage is for- 

 est covered. There are somewhat over 10,000,000 

 acres still held in the Eastern states, largely swamp 

 lands and forest, while for the Western states, 

 Mr. F. H. Newell, a few years ago,^ estimated the 

 public lands open for entry as follows : — 



Brush lands 96,000,000. 



Timber forest 70,000,000. 



Desert 69,000,000. 



Grazing land 374,000,000. 



Since under the existing construction of the land 

 laws, the timber lands on the Pacific coast may be 

 entered as agricultural lands, and since the lumber 

 business of that region in the last few years has been 

 greatly extended, it is fair to assume that by such 

 entries the timber forest area of the public domain 

 has been considerably reduced from that estimate. 



The forest reservations made by the federal 



i U. S. Geol. Survey, Ann. Rep. 1894. 



