36 FOURTEENTH ANNUAL REPORT OF THE 



estation that cannot be well figured. An expenditure of more than $189,000 

 in righting fires was entailed. The State and private property will not 

 recover from the loss in tree growth in fifty years. These fires were not the 

 first ones, nor the most disastrous from which the State and the whole 

 country have suffered. Every year there are more or less fires, and the 

 waste and damage is enormous. Experts claim that more timber has been 

 destroyed by fire than has been cut and legitimately utilized. The loss by 

 fire, insect disease and commercial use each year is four times greater than 

 the natural production. That alone is enough to startle even the most 

 thoughtless person. 



Fires are started in many ways; more by sparks and coals from railroad 

 engines than from any other source. Had not a better patrol system on the 

 railroads been established last spring by this Department, it is doubtful if 

 we would have much green timber standing. The truth of the foregoing 

 suggestion is shown by the fact that many hundred fires were started along 

 the railroad rights of way in this manner, and were promptly extinguished 

 before damage was done. Any one of those fires might have resulted, if 

 allowed to run, in a great conflagration and much destruction of property. 

 Yet, in spite of every effort, eighty-six disastrous fires originated in that 

 way. The loss of commercial timber is the smallest part of it. The 

 destruction of new growth, burning up the soil where it thinly covers the 

 rock formation, preventing reforestation for long periods of years, setting 

 back Nature's work to again cover the ground and protect the water flow, 

 is a resulting damage that cannot be estimated in dollars and cents. 



The following comparative statement of forest fires during 1908 with 

 those of 1903, when the forest fire loss reached its maximum, is interesting 

 and instructive. The results attest the greater efficiency of this Department 

 as now administered. 



Adirondacks and Catskills 



1903 1908 



Number of fires 377 605 



Acres of timberland burned 312,590 198,149 



Acres of wasteland burned 187 , 928 169 , 923 



500,518 368,072 



