186 KANSAS CITY REVIEW OF SCIENCE. 
evidences of storm breeding and stormy anticyclonism will be more still striking, it 
the changes of barometric pressure are studied in connection with the beginnings 
and subsequent growth of cirrus, cumulus, and nimbus clouds, as well as with 
the rainfall and the final breaking up of cloudiness. 
There are good reasons for believing that such study, systematically and 
thoroughly continued under the direction, and with the facilities of the Signal 
Service Bureau, would raise the successful verification of the Washington forecasts 
to an average of at least ninety-five per cent. — Journal of the Franklin Institute. 
IMPROVEMENT OF THE NATIVE PASTURE-LANDS OF THE 
FAR WEST. 
N. S. SHALER. 
It is a well-known fact, that the greater part of the United States west of the 
meridian of Omaha is unfit for tillage. Here and there, there are strips of land, 
which have a larger rainfall, that may be brought under the plough; and along 
the rivers there are narrow belts of land that may be made tillable by irrigation. 
A portion of this region is utterly barren ; but a large part of it — probably not far 
from one million square miles of the whole area, or an area nearly one hundred 
times the surface of Massachusetts — bears a scanty crop of grasses. The natural 
use of this region is already recognized : its sole worth is for the pasturage of cat- 
tle and sheep. Already a great herding industry has been created in this region, 
— one that has an important bearing on the food-supply of this country and of 
Europe. The only limitation on the great extension of this industry is found in 
the scantiness of the herbage and the inadequacy of the water-supply. The latter 
evil is probably remediable, in most cases at least, by wells or by storage reser- 
voirs, which shall retain the abundant waterfall of the rainy season. I propose 
to offer some suggestion concerning the possibility of bettering the herbage of 
forage-plants. 
All the grasses that now grow in that region make a scanty herbage. I am 
informed by stock-raisers that the best " ranges" require from fifteen to twenty 
acres to a head of horned cattle, and that from this unusual goodness the "ranges " 
decline in value, until, in many districts, a hundred acres is required to supply a 
beast. The wide extent of the ranges necessary to afford pasturage to herds of 
profitable numbers makes the supply of water more difficult than it otherwise 
would be. 
It seems to me possible that the pasturage of this region might be materially 
improved by the introduction of grasses and other forage-plants indigenous to 
regions having something like the same conditions of climate. My reasons for 
hope in this matter are substantially as follows : the experience of settlement in 
this country shows that the grasses are more easily feralized than any other of our 
domesticated plants ; several of them show a willingness to escape to the wilder- 
