Arizona republican., 1891-05-15
GOVERNMENT TIMBER.
Reasons Why It Should be More Carefully
 Preserved.

Preserved.
 The department of the government whose duty it is to take care of the tim- Der on unsettled land should be forced to attend some of the horticultural so- ciety and forestry association meetings. He might learn the importance of con- serving the forests and brush on our mountains and canyons. Water is the one great necessity in our section. and our mountains are the natural water gatherers when covered with forests, brushwood, plants and grass. But when these are destroyed and the mountain tops are laid bare by close cropping sheep and the sides cut in furrows by their sharp hoofs these same mountains become terror and devastate the ad- jacent valleys by the floods which other. wise should be stored up for future use. The wealth of this coast is directly de- pendent on the mountains and their plant covering. We are simply desert without regular supply of water. We have no other water supply except the mountains. Bare, treeless, plantless mountains send down what water they do condense in sudden, irresistible floods, carrying death and destruction to all below, and ruin the fairest valleys with boulders and detritus. Our Lest soils are washed into the rivers and the richness of the valleys carried away to the sea. Tree and plant covered mountains store up the water in the form of ice and snow, and the kiss of the summer sun sends it sparkling down the tree and flower lined canyons in gentle benefcent rills and sparkling, roaring trout brooks to the crops below, that with their help know not thirst. Uncle Sam owns the mountains and the plants that cover them. Then why don't he take care of them? He has no business allowing them to be made sheep pastures of, nor allowing vandals to fell their forest covering, He is our agent and servant. We have given him sacred trust to be conserved for us and the future
 Fresno has just completed a great Hume with which to destroy herself by destroying her mountain forests, and is now eager to complete a railroad to run up into her timber so as to destroy her self the quicker.
 The Bear Valley Water company in San Bernardino county is trying to get railroad up into that valley so that they may get few dollars for some knot -holes-Scrub pine rather, which means the same thing--and so ruin what little protection they have on their watershed. This will give the thirty two inches of rainfall, that they some- times have in twenty-four hours, good chance to fill up their grand reservoir with detritus and boulders. If they will cut off the timber and brush ard turn on sheep they will soon have a valley full of boulders instead of a reservoir. San Diego has the same itch ing for little timber in her mountains. How can we expect Uncle Sam to pro- tect us when we constantly destroy our own and our childrens heritage?
 Not one tree should be cut from our mountains except under the guarded sanction of law. No brush should be destroyed, no hoof should pasture on them, no preventable fire should burn | them.
 Instead, wherever tree or plant can grow they should be planted and fos. tered. The mountains and their fora are our present and future capital, our life, our only source of wealth.
 D. B. WEIR