vasions range from 80 to 168 million acres in the West, and as 
high as 240 million acres for the entire United States. 
Drought, which normally occurs 3 years out of every 10 over great 
areas of rangeland, contributes to range depletion and increased 
production costs. Although commonly assumed to be nonpreventable, 
the effects of droughts on grazing lands can in fact be greatly 
reduced by the continued practice of good management. 
All these causes of losses frequently operate on the same lands 
at the same time. For example, overuse may so open up the stand 
of herbaceous forage cover as to stimulate the thickening up of 
brush species. This process may be accentuated by drought, and, 
in turn, may accelerate wind and water erosion. The combined ef- 
fects are a loss in productivity of the land, a reduction in taxable 
wealth, and lowered income. 
Since their effects cannot be separated and no method is known 
by which their combined effects can be determined directly, such 
losses have been estimated by an indirect method. Briefly, this 
method is based on the extent to which production from grazing 
lands could be increased if all known and economically feasible 
measures of improvement were adopted, and on the assumption that 
the increase in income that could be expected from such improve= 
ment is a satisfactory measure of current losses. 
The data presented in Table 32 indicate that the productive capacity 
of United States grazing lands can be more than doubled; such improve= 
ment would result in a 50-percent increase in the net income from 
these lands. 
Table 32, Potential for Improvement of Grazing Lands in the 
United States 
: 3 Improvement Potential 
Classification : Percent of . Equivalent 
of Land _ ; __Area_ ____:Present __s_sACreage 
; Million acres Percent | Million acres 
17 Western States 
Privately owned — 
Range and pasture 365 200 730 
Forest range Th 150 111 
Publicly owned -= 
Range , 215 300 645 
Forest range 105 200 219 
31 Eastern States 
Privately owned -- 
Range and pasture 51 200 102 
Forest range and pasture 61 125 76 
Publicly owned -= 
Forest range and pasture 60 125 100 
Total 951 197k 
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