The West 11 



there, is no water on any gi\Tn area, the only person who 

 can use it is the man who has water on his own land near 

 enough to supply his stock. There is still in the West 

 290,000,000 acres of this "free" range, but it is not as 

 much of a gift as it looks. Owing to the lack of rains, 

 the grass grows only a short time ; however, since the 

 mature grass cures down into a good feed, satisfactory 

 grazing may be obtained at any time of the year that 

 the ground is not covered with snow, providing the 

 grass was not all eaten off as fast as it came through. 

 With free range, no one has control and consequently 

 the man who tries to sa^'e a little grass for the dry season 

 or winter may be only saving it for the other fellow. 

 Consequently, everyone gets what he can while it is grow- 

 ing and during the dry season may have to do without. 

 This necessitates feeding an undue amount of hay, makes 

 poor stock, and eventually ruins the grass. 



Most of the deeded lands outside of Texas were ob- 

 tained from the government by the Homestead Act. 

 Smaller amounts have been obtained under the Swamp 

 Act, Timber and Stone Act, Desert Act, Script, Lieu 

 Lands Act, and various other acts or laws providing for 

 the taking up of government land. At the present time 

 the Homestead Act is the only one applicable to any 

 large areas. 



Winter and summer ranges. 



Summer ranges are those on which the grazing is best 

 in midsummer. Such ranges are found almost entirely 

 in the mountains where the winter snows are deep, and 

 since these higher elevations are mostly in the Forest 

 Reserves, a map of the National Forests is a crude map of 

 the summer ranges. The grass is very dry in the lower 



