A SUMMARY OF THE TIMBER RESOURCE REVIEW 



Table 43. — Status of protection from fire, 1952 







Part of 



area for which pro- 





Area 



tectio 



n is adequate in 





requir- 



the— 





Ownership 



ing pro- 









tection 













Worst 



Average 



Easy 







years 



years 



years 





Million 











acres 



Percent 



Percent 



Percent 



Private 



425 

 140 



12 

 16 



59 

 89 



81 



National forest 



100 



Bureau of Land 











Management 



40 



23 



87 



100 



Indian 



18 



4 



44 



97 



National Park 



6 



57 



99 



100 



Other Federal 



11 



3 



47 



93 



Other public 



33 



35 



76 



93 



All ownerships. _ 



673 



15 



68 



88 



Though 88 percent of the area needing protec- 

 tion receives adequate protection in easy years, 

 and though 68 percent is protected sufficiently 

 well to meet the fire situation in the average year, 

 only 15 percent is protected adequately to meet 

 the fire situation in worst years and under peak 

 load conditions (fig. 32). 



PROTEQION FROM FIRE ADEQUATE FOR: 



WORST 

 YEARS 



IQ 



















AVERAGE 

 YEARS 



















EASY 

 YEARS 











25 



PERC 



50 



.NT OF AREA 



75 



100 



Figure 32 



The degree of protection varies considerably by 

 ownership, particularly with respect to protection 

 that is adequate to meet the situation in the worst 

 and average years. Only 12 percent of the private 

 land and 16 percent of the national forests receive 

 a degree of protection sufficient to adequately 



67 



meet the situation in the worst years (table 43). 

 In contrast, national parks are the best protected 

 with 57 percent adequately protected even in the 

 worst years. 



There were 128 thousand forest fires in the 

 United States in 1952, one-third of which were 

 incendiary fires. An additional 61 percent were 

 also man-caused. Six percent of the fires were 

 due to lightning. Of the man-caused fires (ex- 

 cluding incendiary), the chief causes were debris 

 burning (20 percent) , smoking (20 percent) , camp- 

 ing (4 percent), and railroads and lumbering (5 

 percent). In comparison to some of the esti- 

 mates for 1941-45, the percentage of lightning 

 fires doubled and the percentage of railroads and 

 lumbering fires was almost halved, but the other 

 man-caused fires continued to account for close to 

 90 percent of the total. 



The longtime trend in the area burned each 

 year of all forest land needing protection has been 

 steadily downward during the past quarter of a 

 century, for which fairly reliable statistics have 

 been available. For example, the average annual 

 area burned during 1926-30 was 41.6 million acres. 

 This decreased rather steadily with minor fluctua- 

 tions to the most recent average annual estimate 

 of 11 million acres for 1951-54. This longtime 

 reduction has been due to both the increased effi- 

 ciency of protection techniques and the addition 

 to the protected area of substantial acreages 

 formerly unprotected. 



However, since 1940 the area burned per million 

 acres protected has not declined. This means 

 that recent reductions in total area burned on all 

 land — both protected and unprotected — have been 

 primarily the result of reductions in area burned 

 on land put under protection for the first time. 

 Protection is being extended to the remaining un- 

 protected area at a rate indicating that in the 

 1960's all area will be protected and the area 

 burned annually may level off to about 8.7 million 

 acres. Until protection is intensified and the 

 efficiency of protection techniques improved, 

 further substantial reductions are not likely. 



Reduction in Losses Expected 



The expectation of an average annual burned 

 area of 8.7 million acres during the 1960's repre- 

 sents a reduction of 25 percent from the average 

 area burned each year during 1951-54 and 40 

 percent from the area burned in 1952. This 

 results in an outlook for about a 35-percent 

 reduction in growth impact from fire. 



The outlook for reductions in growth impact 

 from other destructive agents is more difficult to 

 appraise. There are no annual statistics collected 

 over a long period of years on the damage done by 

 insects, disease, animals, and weather. Therefore, 

 statistical trends are not available. However, 



