Forestry and the National Forests 13 
CONCLUSION 
The forest lands of the United States at work would mean settled 
communities and permanent industries. It would mean not only 
continuous supplies of lumber and other timber products for those 
who live close by, but a surplus for the farms and cities in the 
parts where timber is not grown. It would mean a decrease in 
fiood menace through control of streamflow, and increased agricul- 
tural prosperity where land is irrigated. Wild plant and animal 
life could be established to the delight of a nature-loving public, 
while health giving recreation such as can be found only in forest and 
stream would be within reach of millions who need the out of doors. 
In the Southwest the annual per capita consumption of timber 
and timber products is 500 board feet. Properly cut-over timber- 
lands in this region can be made to produce a yearly growth of 
50 to 100 board feet per acre (more favored regions runs three to 
five times as much). Ten acres of growing timber for each person 
would be required to supply the timber needs of the population, it 
is true, but with the 11,000,000 acres of forest land in Arizona and 
New Mexico managed so as to do their best there can be cut every 
year timber products sufficient to supply the common timber needs 
of a million people and the yield sustained in perpetuity. 
Certainly agriculture in no part of the country can be benefited 
more by regulated streamflow and a consequent permanent supply 
of water for irrigation than in the southwest, where the greater 
part of the farming is dependent upon other moisture than direct 
rainfall. Future supplies of fish and game can be assured only 
through forest perpetuation. Recreation, essential to the health and 
happiness of southwestern people, reaches its ideal in forest cover 
on every forest acre. 
Management of the country’s forests is more than a local affair. 
Lands that are not fit for general farming but which will support 
trees become a public liability if not kept busy growing trees. It 
is a problem for the Nation. On its solution depends the stability 
of government and the progress of a great people. It is useless to 
erow timber and then burn it up in forest fires. Protection of the 
timber resources is a proposition too big for private enterprises to 
meet individually. Comprehensive plans in which the owner, and 
State, and Federal Governments work hand in hand offer the only 
hope of success. Management of forest lands so that they will be 
constantly productive should be made economically feasible by tax 
adjustment and whatever additional steps are locally necessary. 
TREES 
I think that | shal/l never see 
A poem /ovely as a tree. 
A tree whose hungry mouth is prest 
Against the earth's sweet flowing breast; 
A tree that /ooks at God al/ day, 
And lifts her leafy arms to pray; 
A tree that may in summer wear 
A nest of robins in her hair; 
Upon whose bosom snow has /ain; 
Who intimately lives with rain. 
Poems are made by men like me, 
But only God can make a tree. 
—Joyce Kilmer. 
