I9O REPORT OF THE FOREST, FISH AND GAME COMMISSION. 



Forest Fires. 



Since dead timber is not left in the forests, there is but little loss from fires. 

 In Saxony, with 435,000 acres of forest, the loss from this cause is rarely more 

 than $300 per annum. Wiirtemberg, with 418,904 acres of forest has an annual 

 loss of about $650. The Duchy of Baden, with 240,000 acres, had only 99 acres 

 burned in nine years.* 



The fires are started mostly by careless smokers and workmen. Locomotives 

 do slight damage, causing, perhaps, not more than ten per cent of the fires. In 

 Wiirtemberg, from 1887 to 1897, there was a total of 120 fires, only eight caused 

 by sparks from locomotives, and among these only one causing considerable 

 damage (S3, 570). f Along the railroads, however, precautionary measures receive 

 considerable attention. In many places along the forested side of the track 

 there is a ditch about eight feet wide, which is kept free of all vegetable growth. 

 Frequently a strip of forest about a rod wide, running parallel with the railroad 

 is specially prepared in the following manner: A path along the edge of the 

 woods is spaded about four feet wide. In the forest, about a rod from this, 

 and running parallel with it, a second path is made. Cross-paths joining these two 

 are made at intervals of a rod. These paths are at all times kept free of vegeta- 

 tion, and the ground in the strip is raked free of leaves and twigs. Sometimes a 

 double strip is made, two rods wide, with three paths parallel with the railroad, 

 and cross-paths as in the single strip. Frequently, the white birch is the tree 

 grown on these strips, but a general opinion prevails that the spruce gives 

 equally good protection with less trouble from the fallen leaves. Occasionally, 

 along a pine forest, can be seen a protecting strip of birch without the spaded 

 paths. 



The forest may belong to a state, a city or other community, a charitable 

 institution, a corporation, or a private individual. The railroads are required to 

 pay in full all damages caused by them to the forest. But, since the railroads 

 are nearly all government property, claims against them are easily adjusted. 

 Locomotives are provided with spark arresters. The right-of-way is sixty-six feet 

 wide and is kept clean. 



The forest itself is intersected more or less with fire lanes, each two or three 



*For further figures in regard to forest fires, see the Tenth Annual Report of Gen. C. C. Andrews, 

 Chief Firewarden of Minnesota. The publication also contains much other useful information in 

 regard to European forestry. 



fU. S. Consular Reports, 1897. Vol. LV, page 64. "Forestry in Wiirtemberg, " W. Hahn. 



