valuable for the protection of navigable streams. The 

 forest cover on the steep slopes of these two forests and 

 the Great Smoky Mountains National Park helps to 

 prevent erosion, retards silting of power reservoirs, 

 reduces flood crests, and helps to maintain an all-year 

 flow of water as well as valuable water storage. Water 

 from the Pisgah National Forest supplies several mountain 

 towns and a large paper plant, and provides part of the 

 requirements of two other large plants. Water from both 

 private and public forest land contributes to the steady 

 operation of about 100 hydroelectric plants in the moun- 

 tains and piedmont. Protective strips of forest land are 

 maintained by power companies around most of the larger 

 lakes that serve as reservoirs. Several cities and towns in 

 the mountains and a few in the piedmont own forested 

 municipal watersheds. With over 30 towns and com- 

 munities using unfiltered surface water, this form of land 

 use should logically increase. 



Cattle grazing is becoming an important use of part of 

 the forest land in the Coastal Plain. Loss of markets for 

 cotton and tobacco, wider planting ol soil-conserving 

 crops that yield supplementary cattle feed, and an attrac- 

 tive price for beef have all accelerated the swing to beef- 

 cattle production. Between 1938 and 1940 the number 

 of beef cattle was increased from about 10,000 to 20,000. 

 If there is continued expansion of this industry, it will 

 lead to the use of many thousands of acres of forest land 

 lor combined grazing and timber production. 



The hardwood forests of the mountain region were 

 used rather intensively for grazing from the time of early 

 settlement until shortly after 1900. Sheep, hogs, goats, 

 and cattle were allowed free range and livestock concen- 

 trations as high as 1 animal unit to 7 acres existed in 

 some localities. This intense grazing caused serious 

 damage to the young growth, resulted in the consumption 

 of a large part of the oak mast, and in effect tended to 

 prevent the establishment of new crops of young trees. 

 The damage was augmented by forest fires, set for the 

 dual purpose of destroying the underbrush and encourag- 

 ing the development of grass. The damaging effect of 

 grazing upon the hardwood forests was recognized early 

 by the Forest Service and commercial grazing was pro- 

 hibited on the Pisgah and Nantahala National Forests 

 soon after their establishment. This action was influential 

 in reducing the amount of grazing in privately owned 

 hardwood forests. With more effective Federal and 

 State fire protection, the underbrush and young second 

 growth in the hardwood stands restocked the land so 

 thickly that administration of commercial herds became 

 increasingly difficult. Hardwood-forest grazing is now 

 limited chiefly to small numbers of domestic stock. 



Forest-Land Ownership 



Complete information on landownership in the State 

 is not available, but it is reasonably certain that about 

 90 percent of the forest land is in private ownership. In 

 1935 more than half of the forest land was in farms (table 



Figure 11. — The sport provided for thousands of fishermen each year by the clear mountain streams is greatly enhanced by the densely wooded slopes. 

 554915° — 4.3 2 



