American Forest Congress 239 



An investigation was made of the Yellowstone re- 

 serve, the largest in the United States, which required 

 no days and 1,800 miles of travel by a skilled engineer 

 and forest expert and their assistants. As a result 

 of their investigation they recommended the elimina- 

 tion from the reserve of 559,350 acres of grazing and 

 agricultural lands and the addition of 130,560 acres 

 of outside timber lands, making a net reduction in the 

 reserve of 428,800 acres. This recommendation was 

 approved by the Commissioner of the General Land 

 Office and the Forester, and the change in the reserva- 

 tion area directed by presidential proclamation. A 

 similar investigation was made of the Big Horn forest 

 reserve, Wyoming, which was reduced in size by 

 eliminating 65,000 acres. 



I am of the opinion that still more liberality could 

 be shown in granting grazing privileges without detri- 

 ment to the objects for which the reserves were created 

 and with great benefit to those living within the vicinity 

 of the reserves. 



Wyoming has many resources. It is one of the 

 leading coal producing States of the Union. It has 

 shipping mines of copper and iron. It produces oil 

 of superior quality and in great quantity. Its building 

 stone is used in many outside States, and it has as many 

 farms in proportion to population as any State in the 

 Union. But the chief industry of Wyoming is the 

 raising of live stock, and under the conditions which 

 have prevailed for nearly half a century, grazing on 

 the public domain constitutes the principal method of 

 live stock raising. To arbitrarily withdraw from 

 general public use an area of over 7,000,000 acres, 

 which is perhaps twenty per cent, of the public grazing 

 lands of the State, would seriously endanger this great 

 live stock industry if needlessly severe regulations were 



