FORESTRY COMMISSIONER 45 



The following are a few extracts from this noteworthy 

 report : 



NEGLECT OF REPRODUCTIVE MEASURES. 



' 'But a well regulated water supply is not the only thing 

 dependent on the preservation of forests. In civilized 

 nations the demand for lumber and other forest products 

 is continuous, and requires systematic and intelligent 

 forest reproduction. Numerous districts in our country 

 have now no more timber than is needed for early use, 

 and if forest reproduction is not encouraged local timber 

 scarcity in the not distant future seems inevitable. The 

 enormous waste from forest fires, incendiary and- acci- 

 dental, which prevail in nearly every part of the United 

 States, the extravagant modes of lumbering, especially in 

 the West, permitting valuable logs to rot in the brush on 

 account of slight defects, and the universal neglect of all 

 reproductive measures, threaten the prosperity of the 

 country and should receive early attention from the 

 Government." 



FOREST FIRES. 



' 'No human agency can stop a Western forest fire when 

 it has obtained real headway, and the only hope of avert- 

 ing the enormous losses which the country suffers every 

 year from this cause is in preventing fires from start- 

 ing IN the forests or in extinguishing them promptly. 

 They will always occur, but the experience gained in the 

 Yellowstone National Park since it has been patrolled by 

 detachments of the United States army and in Canada 

 shows conclusively that with the aid of disciplined forest 

 rangers intelligently directed the number of forest fires in 

 any district can be greatly reduced, and that it is fre- 

 quently possible to extinguish small fires if they are ener- 

 getically attacked when first discovered. " 



