Domimon Forest Reserves 87 



The most difficult problem in Canada is pro- 

 tecting the forests from fire. 



In the Northwest, where the Dominion reserves 

 lie, winds are high, summers are bright, and rainy 

 days are few. The trees are nearly all cone-bear- 

 ers, full of inflammable gum and resin. The 

 living trees are loaded with dry dead branches, 

 shrouded in moss. The forest floor is covered 

 with prostrate decaying timber, through which fire 

 can creep as it does through punk. There are 

 large areas of burned forest, called by the French- 

 Canadian name brule, where the ground is piled 

 with fallen charred wood as dry as tinder. Few 

 of the streams or lakes are large enough to stop 

 a raging fire, and except these there are no natural 

 barriers to check a conflagration. 



In many places, along the banks of ponds and 

 streams or on level ground, there is what the 

 Canadians call muskeg (Fig. 23) — deep swamp 

 land upgrown with big bushes. When this dries 

 out, in the northwestern land of bright sunshine 

 and little rain, there is exposed a thick mat of dead 

 vegetation (Fig. 24). In this, fire is hatched and 

 cherished, so that it has been known to live and 

 smolder all through the winter, and break forth 

 with the return of spring. 



The young growth which follows a fire is also 

 very inflammable, so that great tracts in the Can- 

 ada woods have been burned over again and again. 



In the pioneer period of the Canadian Westj 



