200 FIFTEENTH ANNUAL REPORT OF THE 



was noticed more on Whiteface than any other mountain, owing to the 

 elevation being so much greater. This of course necessitates our having 

 the stations nearer together, possibly not over fifteen miles apart. 



The whole secret of the forest fire proposition is getting onto the fire 

 when it starts. If we can have our stations in closer range, equipped with 

 proper instruments, and the right kind of watchers, supported by a good 

 live patrol force, the problem of protecting the Adirondacks will be solved, 

 I believe. While the past season has been very favorable for us, we have 

 had many very severe fires started that would have burned over hundred 

 of acres it it had not been for the ability of the force to get at them when 

 they started. I have in mind an instance where we were just twelve 

 minutes getting men to a fire that was ten miles from the station ; another 

 instance our watcher observed a fire, which was perfectly visible to him 

 from the mountain but was so small that a patrolman was nearly one-half 

 day finding it, and which proved to be only a burning stump that some 

 hunter had left without extinguishing. 



We have had in this district one hundred and twenty-nine fires, thirty- 

 eight of which were first observed from the Whiteface observation station, 

 and seventeen from the Mt. Morris station. Twenty-one of these fires 

 were caused by railroads and the others by berry pickers, hunters, fishermen, 

 and unknown causes. We have had a large number of berry pickers' fires 

 to contend with during the season. This is a source that we have had very 

 little trouble from in former years, but which will be an important factor 

 in the furure as there seems to be a desire among then to burn tracts over 

 every two or three years in order to get a new growth of berry bushes, and 

 this cannot be done without endangering the forest land in that vicinity. 



A very good comparison of the efficiency of the service, and the benefit 

 derived from the observation stations this year and in former years is found 

 in the statistics of my three counties. Clinton county, with a total of 

 twenty-one fires, burned over nearly a third larger area than Essex and 

 Franklin counties with a total of eighty-seven fires. Clinton county had 

 no protection from observation stations and no patrol service until late in 

 the season, while Essex and Franklin had the benefit of the service. The 

 State owns in this district 450,000 acres of forest lands. Less than seventy- 

 five acres of this was burned over this season by forest fires. 



