House and Garden 
The need of establishing a national forest reserve 
in the Southern Appalachians has recently been in¬ 
vestigated with great care by the Department of 
Agriculture. As a result, official statements to this 
effect have been made. 1 his region contains the 
highest peaks and largest mountain masses east of 
the Rockies. It is the great physiographic feature of 
the eastern half of the continent, and no such lofty 
mountains are covered with hardwood forests in all 
North America. Upon these mountains descends 
the heaviest rainfall of the United States, except 
that of the North Pacific coast. It is often of ex¬ 
treme violence, as much as eight inches having fallen 
in ii hours, 31 inches in one month, and 105 inches 
in a year. The tree roots, mosses, underbrush and 
plants break the fall of rain drops, draw them into 
little reservoirs and give them out months later in the 
form of springs. Without the protection of forests 
the rain would tear up the soil and rush into the rivers 
where it would cause great freshets. In the season of 
drought even large streams would entirely dry up. 
The soil, once denuded of its forests and swept by 
torrential rains, rapidly loses first its humus and then 
its rich upper strata, and finally is washed in enor¬ 
mous volume into the streams, to bury such of the fer¬ 
tile lowlands as are not eroded by the floods, to ob¬ 
struct the rivers, and to fill up the harbors on the 
coast. More good soil is now washed from these 
cleared mountain-side fields during a single heavy 
rain than during centuries under forest cover. 
The rivers which originate in the southern Appala¬ 
chians flow into or along the edges of every State from 
Ohio to the Gulf, and from the Atlantic to the Mis¬ 
sissippi. Along their courses are agricultural, water 
power and navigation interests, whose preservation is 
absolutely essential to the well-being of the nation. 
Probably no region in the United States is better 
watered or better drained than this: nor is there any 
other region which can boast of being the source of 
so many streams. From about its northern end the 
J 
New River (Kanawha) flows northward and west¬ 
ward and becomes a prominent tributary of the 
Ohio. Along its southeastern front the James, the 
Roanoke, the Yadkin, the Catawba, the Broad and 
the Savannah reach the Atlantic. Near its southern 
end the Chattahoochee and the Alabama flow di¬ 
rectly into the Gulf of Mexico. Along its western 
the Hiawassee, the Tuckaseegee, the French Broad, 
the Nolachucky, the Watauga and the Flo Is ton 
drain westward through the Tennessee into the 
M ississippi. 
The regulation of the flow of these rivers can be 
accomplished only by the conservation of the forests. 
These are the heaviest and most beautiful hard¬ 
wood forests of the continent. In them species from 
East and West, from North and South, mingle in a 
growth of unparalleled richness and variety. They 
contain many species of the first commercial value 
and furnish important supplies which cannot be ob¬ 
tained from any other region. 
For economic reasons the preservation of these 
forests is imperative. Their existence in good con¬ 
dition is essential to the prosperity of the lowlands 
th rough which their waters run. Maintained in 
productive condition they will supply indispensable 
materials which must fail without them. Their 
management, under practical and conservative for¬ 
estry will sustain and increase the resources of this re¬ 
gion and of the nation at large, will serve as an inval¬ 
uable object lesson in the advantages and practica¬ 
bility of forest preservation by use, and will soon be 
self-supporting from the sale of timber. 
The agricultural resources of the Southern Appala¬ 
chian region must be protected and preserved. To 
that end the preservation of the forests is an indis¬ 
pensable condition which will lead not to the reduc¬ 
tion but to the increase of the yield of agricultural 
products. 
The floods in these mountain-born streams, if this 
forest destruction continues, will increase in fre¬ 
quency and violence and in the extent of their dam¬ 
ages, both within this region and across the bordering 
States. l he extent of these damages, like those 
from the washing of the mountain fields and roads, 
cannot be estimated with perfect accuracy, but dur¬ 
ing the present year alone the total has approximated 
$10,000,000, a sum sufficient to purchase the entire 
area recommended for the proposed reserve. But 
this loss cannot be estimated in money value alone. 
Its continuance means the early destruction of condi¬ 
tions most valuable to the nation and which neither 
skill nor wealth can restore. 
The preservation of the forests, of the streams, and 
of the agricultural interests here described can be 
successfully accomplished only by the purchase and 
creation of a national forest reserve. The States 
of the Southern Appalachian region own little or no 
land, and their revenues are inadequate to carry out 
this plan. Federal action is obviously necessary, is 
fully justified by reasons of public necessity and may 
be expected to have most fortunate results. 
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