Livestock pastured in privately owned and national forests makes a 

 significant contribution to our food supply. Moreover, wild game from 

 the forest is a source of some of our food. 



Besides supplying certain foods, the forest is largely the source of materials 

 for the containers in which our foods are packaged and marketed. Card- 

 board packages, heavy brown cartons, wooden crates, and baskets bring our 

 food to us in excellent condition. About half the cellophane, a popular 

 material for food packages, is made from wood. 



In Florida alone there are nearly 40 food-container manufacturers. 

 Boxes, crates, lugs, hampers, and baskets are made of yellow pine, tupelo, 

 sweetgum, evergreen magnolia, sweet bay, and several other woods. These 

 industries use about 145 million board feet of wood a year for fruit and 

 vegetable containers, lumber sufficient to build more than 7,000 six-room 

 houses. 



Forests, fuel, and clothing. — Fuel for heating houses and cooking food is 

 another contribution of the forest to man's welfare and comfort. Al- 

 though oil, gas, and electricity are replacing wood as fuel, firewood is 

 still much used, particularly in rural communities. More than one-fourth 

 of the total wood consumed annually in the United States is used for fuel. 

 The total world consumption of wood fuel is equal to 250 to 300 million 

 tons of coal. 



Wood has long been used for shoes and in some countries is still commonly 

 used for this purpose. In this country wooden shoes are used by workmen 

 in some industries and the wooden heel is common, particularly on women's 

 shoes. Much of the leather for footwear is tanned with extracts from forest 

 trees. 



Rayon made from wood fiber has proved itself as a garment fabric. 



The forest also produces furs. Several of our most important fur bearers; 

 namely, the muskrat, martin, fisher, and beaver, live in or along forest 

 streams. Others, such as the fox, mink, and raccoon, frequent forest 

 areas. 



Forests and water for domestic use. — Millions of people depend on the for- 

 ested watersheds for their water supply but not all of them realize it 

 (fig. 7, A). A forested mountain slope acts like a sponge in holding rain 

 water or melting snow and releasing it gradually, thereby regulating stream 

 flow supplying pure and abundant water for domestic use. Big cities 

 consume billions of gallons of water daily. The New York City water- 

 supply system provides a dependable yield of 1,050 million gallons of water 

 a day, more than half of which is brought by a gigantic chain of aqueducts 

 and reservoirs from the forested Catskill Mountains 100 miles to the north, 

 the rest coming from the Croton watershed. 



Forests, illumination, and communication. — The forest supplied the pine 

 knot, the torch, and the log fire which lighted the homes of our fore- 

 fathers or provided them with means of communication in times of danger 

 or distress. Today our homes, streets, and public and industrial buildings 

 are flooded with electric light and threaded with lines of communication. 

 An increasing proportion of the electricity for these services is developed 

 from water power which in turn is dependent to a large degree on water 

 from lands protected by forests (fig 7, £). Were it not for such protection 

 the smaller power reservoirs would fill with silt, much of the water would 

 run off in floods, and the dams would be inadequate to hold enough water 

 over periods of drought. 



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