NEED FOR FORESTS. 19 



humus so that it will not blow.^ This is especially true of the low 

 rolling hills of the Platte region of Nebraska and of the Kansas hills. 

 Much of the sand-hill ground is too precipitous for agriculture. 



NEED FOR FORESTS IN THE SAND-HILL REGION. 



Nebraska and Kansas have about as small a proportion of forest 

 area as any two States in the Union. The natural forests are con- 

 fined to belts of hardwoods along the eastern borders of these two 

 States and to the pine forests of northwestern Nebraska. The 

 States produce practically no softwood lumber. While under present 

 conditions lumber is imported from the Northwest more cheaply than 

 it could possibly be grown in these States, the cheap supply of that 

 region will ultimately be exhausted. With the depletion of the 

 natural timber supphes in the Lake States and the Northwest, the 

 prairie States will eventually have great difficulty in obtaining lumber. 

 Therefore a supply of lumber for the future is one object of forest 

 planting in the sand hills. 



A more important consideration, however, is the question of a 

 local timber supply m connection with the stock-raising and agri- 

 cultural industries of the sand-hill regions themselves. A large part 

 of the demand from ranches is for fence posts and unsawed timber 

 for other improvements. Smce the native cedar has been largely 

 exhausted it has been necessary to purchase timber at dispropor- 

 tionately high rates. 



Wliile it can not be said that forests are needed in the sand-hill 

 regions to conserve water, since the hiUs themselves are perfect reser- 

 voirs and the streams ah drain to the east, where water for irrigation 

 is not at present needed, stiU the planting of forests in the sand hills 

 wiU check the wind locally and generafiy it will prevent the further 

 encroachment of the sand dunes on the fertile land to the east and 

 will ameliorate the dryness of the atmosphere so that the agricultural 

 land to the east may receive a greater amount of jj^pcipitation. Of 

 these mfluences the local effects of groves of trees acting as wind- 

 breaks win be felt first, and for this reason the planting of trees by 

 local residents after the Government has thoroughly experimented 

 with species and methods should be strongly encouraged. Forests 

 should not only help to make tillable those soils which are already 

 fertile by reducing the exposure to wind, but planted extensively on 

 poor soils, they should ultimately make them fertile enough and 

 should so change the physical composition of the soil that they may 

 be tilled with safety. 



Extensive forests on rough land are for timber and for general 

 climatic effect. The less extensive, which will be planted on roUing 

 land, are directly to benefit agriculture through their local effects on 

 wind and soil. 



1 The Control of Blowing Soils, Farmers' Bulletin 421, U. S. Dept. of Agriculture. 



