4t FOREST FIRES. 



reasonably assume that the forester will find no class in favor of the 

 irresponsibly-sat forest fires of the present. Forest fires today are 

 the outgrowth of ignorance, reckless indifference or criminaLty. 



HOW FOREST FIRES ORIGINATE. 



In the Eastern and in the Southern States especially locomotives 

 often originate forest fires. This is seldom the case in California. The 

 fj fference is due to the following points: 



1st. FUEL: This in California is nearly all coal or petroleum. 

 Where wood is used the districts are the least dry in which railroads 

 run. 



2nd. CLIMATE: The long season of sunshine and absence of 

 rain renders everything in California very dry. Field crops are dry 

 before gathering especially the vast acreage in grain is every summer 

 especially liable to fire. For this reason railroads running through 

 these districts are unusually careful about cinders and fire from their 

 locomotives. 



3rd. The care required to protect bridges, culverts, trestles, t.m- 

 bered tunnels and snow sheds protects the forests also. The locomo- 

 tive is not an important source of forest fires in California. 



The causes of forest fires in California are estimated to be as fol- 

 io v.'s: 



1st. Sheep herders, mainly carelessness, also to improve feed for 

 next year. 



2nd. Campers — carelessness. 



3rd. Mountain residents to clear off undergrowth and improve 

 feed for small local bands of animals. 



4th. Stockmen — same. 



5th. Var'ous persons for malice or revenge. 



The reports in regard to some of the temporary fire patrols, both 

 of last year's government forces and of some of those sent out the year 

 before by water companies along the Sierra Madre, invite us to add 

 another cause for forest fires. This is the irresponsible political 

 loafer about street corners, setting forest fires to get a job to put out 

 forest fires. No proof of this has been adduced, but there is a good 

 deal of cumulative circumstantial evidence that forest fires were set and 

 were reset or renewed by those seeking to be or in the government pay 

 as fire extinguishers. This cause, as far as it exists, will be eliminated 

 by a proper organization of the forest patrol force. 



