526 DEPARTMENTAL REPORTS. 



this district is at the point of Cape Cod, where the State of Massa- 

 chusetts owns a tract of several hundred acres known as the " Province 

 Lands." Here at considerable expense the State has arrested the 

 worst dunes hy the planting of grasses. Grasses hold the sand tem- 

 porarily, but it is only where trees have been used that the land may 

 be said to be permanently reclaimed and to have attained practical 

 value. The Bureau first considered most carefully the results, of the 

 work done on the Province Lands. This study assisted it in devising 

 methods of reclamation in other places along the coast. As a result 

 of this investigation it has begun to prepare tree-planting plans for 

 owners of sandy areas along the coasts, under the general plan of 

 cooperation in forest planting. 



COLUMBIA RIVER DUNES. 



Some of the most extensive and mobile sand dunes of the United 

 States are to be found in the lower valley of the Columbia River, in 

 Washington and Oregon. On the outer portion of the valley exten- 

 sive farms and orchards have been developed on soil of great fertility, 

 and between Pasco, Wash. , and the Cascade Mountains the line of 

 the Oregon Railroad and Navigation Company has been built. Both 

 the railroad and the farming interests suffer great loss from the shift- 

 ing sands. Bearing orchards have been completely engulfed, and 

 valuable buildings have had to be moved because of it. 



The sand of the Columbia River is much lighter than the sand of 

 the Atlantic coast, on account of the quantity of mica which it con- 

 tains. This makes it easily blown by the wind and also gives it great 

 fertility when once fixed and supplied with water, so that with the 

 reclamation of the sand dunes there are possibilities of profitable 

 orchards and farm lands in connection with the belts of forest which 

 will necessarily have to be established. 



During the past year the Bureau has made a very careful investi- 

 gation of the sand districts of the Columbia River. They have been 

 mapped, and the trees which naturally thrive in sand in that region 

 and which might be used were the work of reclamation begun have 

 been closely studied. In addition a strip of land from 1 to 6 miles 

 wide lying along the Columbia River, between Willow Creek and 

 John Day River, has been withdrawn from settlement for experiment. 

 This withdrawal contains some of the worst sand dunes of the entire 

 river and will afford an opportunity for an extensive trial of the 

 practicability of changing waste areas of this type into fertile agri- 

 cultural land. 



Expenditures. 



The expenditures in forest extension during the past year amounted 

 to $41, 977. 69, or 14. 4 per cent of the total appropriation for the Bureau, 



Work for the Ensuing Year. 



The linos of work which have been laid down in the past will be 

 continued and strengthened during the coming year. The addition 

 of several field assistants to the force engaged in forest-extension 

 work will easily make this possible. 



Cooperative work in forest planting between the Bureau and land- 

 owners is now firmly established and may be extended just so far as 



