TIMBER GROWING AND LOGGING PRACTICE IN CALIFORNIA H 
FIRE PROTECTION AND SLASH DISPOSAL 
THE GENERAL PROTECTIVE SYSTEM 
The general protective system applying to all forest lands should 
be intensive enough to prevent serious damage to merchantable 
timber or advance reproduction. Success in growing timber de- 
mands that the average yearly burned area shall not exceed one- 
fifth of 1 per cent of the entire forest area. This rate of loss will 
not seriously reduce the productive area of a forest property in the 
75 to 100 years requirecl to produce a new timber crop. On the 
other hand, a figure even approaching the present 2 per cent to 3 
per cent of cut-over lands burned annually will so greatly cut into 
the timber growth and leave so much land with no commercial 
forest that profitable management becomes impossible. Systematic 
fire protection before, during, and after logging is thus a measure 
of prime importance. 
Since preservation of advance reproduction is so important in 
continuing the stand, it follows that broadcast burning of the 
virgin forests should be avoided, because even light surface fires 
destroy most if not all of the young growth. Light or controlled 
burning has been found a futile and costly expedient for reducing 
hazard in the forest (llf). The practice is difficult to carry out, 
involves material sacrifices of both mature timber and reproduction, 
and thus leads to the very sort of loss it seeks to prevent. The 
insignificant reduction of hazard accomplished by light burning is 
soon more than offset by increase of inflammable material created by 
burning. Therefore "light burning'' has no place in even the crudest 
attempt at timber growing. 
Wherever fire occurs in virgin forests the minimum damage 
is the serious reduction of the advance reproduction and the burn- 
ing down of occasional mature trees. 
Years of experience of the Forest Service show that with large 
and somewhat broken holdings an annual expenditure of 1.5 to 2.5 
cents per acre per year for an organization* for suppression of 
fires will result in less than 1 per cent per year burned over. Most 
timber owners buy protection of their lands from the Forest Service 
at the rates applicable to national forest lands. This expenditure 
is, however, inadequate, to guarantee protection on compact hold- 
ings of a few thousand acres. Some owners recognize this and 
insist on more intensive protection. Also as timber becomes more 
valuable the scale of protection will inevitably be raised. 
For adequate protection on the smaller or more compact hold- 
ings a general average expenditure of at least 3 to 4 cents per acre 
per year will be needed, using the type of organization developed 
on the national forests. This includes the retiring of investment 
in telephone, ttails, and other protection improvement, wages of 
fire guards, and suppression costs. It provides, in the virgin forest, 
one-hour control, or an organization capable of putting suppression 
forces on a fire within one hour after its start. On cut-over lands 
the general protectiA^e system should provide half-hour control, at 
an average yearly cost of 6 to 8 cents an acre. 
*A standard fire-control system provides for systematic detection of fires, for rapid 
transmission of messages concerning location of fires, for dispatchers to initiate action, 
and for guai'ds to start suppression work, togettier with the necessary tools, equipment, 
means of transport, and roads and trails. 
