49 
and especially that he keep the area free, so far as lies within his power, 
from forest fires. 
As an illustration [ may cite the Fish Lake range in the Three Sisters 
range district. This range is divided into five smaller ranges, known as 
The Parks, Bald Mountain, Iron Mountain, Browder Ridge, and the 
Blue Riverrange. These altogether will support, without overgrazing, 
“1x bands averaging 2,000 each, one band upon each of the first four, 
two bands upon the last. In 1896 there were eight bands on the Fish 
Lake range, two of them on The Parks, one on Bald Mountain, one on 
Tron Mountain. the other four on Browder Ridge and the Blue River 
range, alternating one or two on the former and three or two on the 
latter. This was a larger number of sheep than the Fish Lake range 
could support properly, and as a result the sheep did not all come out in 
ecvod condition and there was general dissatisfaction among the owners. 
By the adoption of the system here proposed, the number of sheep 
allowed on the Fish Lake range would be limited to 12,000. No other 
sheep would be permitted to go into the Fish Lakerange. Each owner 
would be assigned that subdivision of the range on which he had been 
accustomed to run his sheep, and would be supported and defended 
in his exclusive right to graze there. In return, it would be the duty 
of the owner occupying Browder Ridge to see that no forest fires be 
allowed to occur on that area, either those set carelessly and intention- 
ally by his own herder or packer, or those set by any hunter, camper, 
or other person who might be on that territory. If forest fires did 
occur on Browder Ridge and the Interior Department was satisfied 
that the owner or his employees had not made every reasonable effort 
to prevent them or, when once started, to extinguish them, his permit 
would be terminated forthwith, and if evidence of collusion in setting 
the fires were shown, one or all of the persons concerned would still be 
liable to prosecution under the forest-fire laws. 
ADVANTAGES TO THE GOVERNMENT AND THE SHEEP OWNER, 
To the Government the chief advantage of such a system would be 
to prevent a very large proportion of the tires that occur in the sheep- 
grazing area. The enormous annual Joss in burned timber would at 
once be checked. By the granting of a permit for a particular area, the 
responsibility of the owner is direct and his sense of that responsibility 
is keen. Under the old system an owner may range anywhere, with 
any humber of sheep, and the Government knows neither where he is 
nor what he is doing. 
The advantages to the sheep owner are several and important. The 
adage, ‘‘ Every man for himself and the devil take the hindermost,” was 
never more justly applicable to any business than to this one of grazing 
sheep on the public Jands. It is to the interest of each owner to get 
his sheep sheared as early in the season as possible, even before the cold 
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