SOME FORESTRY PROBLEMS OP THE PRAIRIES OF THE MIDDLE WEST. 
BY HUGH P. BAKER. 
A residence of several years in one of the central prairie states and two sea- 
sons spent in studying natural conditions through a belt of prairie country from 
the Mississippi to the foothills of the. Rockies makes me feel that the problems 
of prairie forestry are not only intensely interesting, but that their early solu- 
tion will be of vast importance to the future agricultural and commercial de- 
velopment of the entire middle West. 
The Region Considered. 
To more clearly define the region, the forestry problems of which will be 
considered in this paper, a broad belt of country has been selected lying be- 
tween the lines of mean annual rainfall of 15 inches on the west and 30 inches 
on the east and including all or large parts of the states of Minnesota, North 
and South Dakota, Iowa, Nebraska and Kansas. There is no part of the region, 
where there is sufficient soil, that forest trees cannot be grown successfully, but 
until there is a much greater forest covering than at present it will not be as 
simple a matter to make .trees grow as it is farther east or west, where condi- 
tions of rainfall and wind currents are more favorable. There is really con- 
siderable similarity in the soils of the entire region and there are no soils 
except the acid soils of peat swamps that are not fitted for the successful com- 
mercial production of forest trees. 
The entire region except northeastern Minnesota and the Black Hills country 
is essentially treeless, though there are numerous indications that this was not 
always so. There have been some desultory and incomplete studies of early sur- 
face conditions in the region, but not enough data has yet accumulated to justify 
definite statements as to any forest cover that may have existed in late geological 
times or as to the causes for present treelessness. Systematic investigations of 
peat bogs which exist here and there throughout the region might throw much 
light on the subject. We are, however, safe in believing that the treeless condi- 
tion is not due to any one cause, but to a combination of causes or factors, such 
as annual or periodical fires, wind, lack of precipitation and fineness of soil. 
Opportunities for the Practice of Forestry. 
This region offers large opportunity for the practice of forestry with conse- 
quent solution of the problems of prairie forestry for two reasons. First, the 
large amount of non-agricultural land existing in the states included in the re- 
gion. Ordinarily one thinks of this whole section of country as a rich prairie 
covered with grain and stock farms, and it is an exceedingly rich section. The 
total area of the six states under consideration is 447,425 square miles. The 
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