fOREST RESERVES IN IDAHO. 19 



June 11, 1904. 

 Zeport on Senator Heyburn's Letters on Idaho Forest Reserves. 

 BITTER ROOT. 



In discussing the effect which the existing Bitter Root Eeserve has 

 upon the State, Senator Ileyburn says : 



This reservation covers some of the oldest settlements in the State of Idaho, 

 some of the most important mining camps, and many valleys adapted to agri- 

 cultural settlement, also much land valuable for home-makinng purposes. 

 * * * The system as now executed is paralyzing the growth of the State of 

 Idaho. Business men and mining investors will not invest money within a 

 forest reserve. 



The Geological Survey, in its Twentieth Annual Eeport, has this 

 to say of these lands adapted to settlement and agriculture : 



The land fit for agriculture in the Idaho portion of the Bitter Root Reserve 

 Is limited to a few localities, and the acreage is small. The canyon-like forma- 

 tion of the lower portion of the Lochsa and of the entire Selway and Salmon 

 River valleys precludes the existence of any considerable tract of arable bottom 

 lands along these streams. The hillsides are everywhere too steep for cultiva- 

 tion, and the meadows existing on some of the upper tributaries of the South 

 Fork of the Clearwater and the head of njost of the tributaries of the Lochsa, 

 the Selway, and the Salmon River drainage within the reserve, are either too 

 marshy or too frosty, owing to their altitude, to permit of the growing of crops. 

 Farming, or more properly gardening, is carried on in the valley of the Middle 

 Fork at a place known as Syringa, about h miles below the junction of the 

 Selway and Lochsa, where there are two farm locations with a total of 20 acres 

 under the plow and a possibility of 100 or 120 more by clearing off the forest. 

 Above this, at the junction of the Selway and the Lochsa, are two more farms, 

 each with 15 acres under tillage, and a possibility of adding 10 or 15 more by 

 clearings. There is one ranch location in the Selway Valley about 7 miles 

 above its mouth, with no clearings. Along the Salmon River there are patches, 

 varying from 2 to 25 acres in extent, as far down as Horse Creek, in the aggre- 

 gate 200 or 2.50 acres. * * * -pj^^ grazing lands within the reserve consist 

 of the large meadows scattered on the upper tributaries of the South Fork of 

 the Clearwater, Elk Creek, American, Red, and Crooked rivers, with the very 

 numerous lesser ramifications of the same along the smaller affluents of these 

 streams and a tract on Little Camas Prairie, between the Lochsa and Lolo 

 forks, of about 8,000 acres. They contain in the aggregate between 7,000 and 

 8,000 acres. A considerable portion is occupied by permanent settlers and 

 utilized for hay lands and pasturage. 



It appears, then, that including everything which can be called 

 agriculture in any sense, w^hether merely wild hay land or already 

 under valid settlement and so unaffected by the reserve, the entire 

 Idaho portion of the reserve contains l)ut 9,000 acres of agricultural 

 land, or less than three-hundredths of 1 per cent. As to the paralyz- 

 ing influence upon business and mining, it is probably true that there 

 have been instances of annoying overzealousness and officiousness on 

 the part of minor officers, but it is equally true that many residents 

 have refused to comply with the perfectly reasonable conditions. 

 Moreover, the recently recommended elimination of areas around 

 Buffalo Hump and Elk City, the only important camps, will remove 

 practically all such complications. 



PRIEST RIVER. 



Senator Heyburn passes next to the Priest River Reserve, wdiich he 

 says contains 645,120 acres and " a vast amount of land fit for home 

 making and settlement." 



