The Black Hills union and western stock review. [volume] (Rapid City, S.D.) 1904-19??, 1910-03-04
FORESTS-DRY FARM
Several Reasons Why Farmer Is
Interested in Conserving Trees.
They Catch Snow in Billiards ana
Hold It Late in Season, and Leaves
and Rubbish Form Dams,
Holding Water Back.

Hold It Late in Season, and Leaves
and Rubbish Form Dams,
Holding Water Back.
The dry farmer is interested in
the conservation Of the forests for
several good reasons, writes E. r.
Parsons in Ranch and Range.
The trees catch snow in the bliz-
yards and hold it late in the season,
the leaves and rubbish dam it back
from running off into the streams and
thus prevent waste of moisture and
erosion of our mountain soils.
Every drop of water that remains
with US to help dampen our atmo-
sphere is so much gain. Every drop
that finds it's way into the rivers and
down to the sea, dead loss. But
the most important reason Of all is
this.
Every plant, every tree takes up its
food in solution with water; when this
gested and assimilated the surplus
water is thrown off by the leaves and
transpires into the atmosphere.
An ordinary apple tree may give
of from 20 to 80 gallons of water
day. good-sized cottonwood 100
gallons, a big Engelmann spruce. sew
eral hundred gallons.
Now, If one tree can transpire into
the atmosphere several hundred gal
Ions, forest ten miles square can
throw off during the day enough
moisture to- make a good-sized cloud
burst over an area Of several square
miles. This is easy to figure out.
Now most of this water is from
melted SHOWS which but for the exist
ence of these trees would have run
off and been lost. The roots of some
of our big evergreens reach a hundred
feet down to bedrock and pump water
back into the atmosphere from great
depths which otherwise would have
escaped from the surface, perhaps
forever.
Perhaps you will say: What has all
this to do with the dry FARM"
(; Just this much: In the growing sea
son, when our clouds come floating
gayly over the mountains and strike
dry streak of air they begin to dis
sipate and dry up without giving us
a shower. They are absorbed by the
hot, dry atmosphere.
But on the other hand, suppose they
strike damp forest. lakes and reser-
voirs, what happens then?
The clouds begin to gain in moist
ure, growing before our very eyes, un-
til the point of saturation is reached
they can hold no more-the floodgates
are opened and we get shower.
When our hygrometers show plenty
of moisture in the air and we hear the
train whistles from afar, we know
that almost any cloud will make
rain, but when the air overhead is dry
then our clouds go floating by to raise
crops in Kansas and Nebraska.
Our rainfall has undoubtedly suf-
fered through the firing and deyastat-
ing of our forests, but on the whole
believe we have gained more than
we have lost, by the building of reser-
voirs. bitches and irrigation works in
general, the water from which when
turned onto the heated soil of our
fields evaporates millions of tons into
the atmosphere every day of the sum-
mer season, besides this we must
take into account every plowed field
which catches and holds moisture,
every crop which transpires this
moisture into the atmosphere, for
every hill of corn, every plant of al
falfa or grain, throws off into the
air many times Its own weight in
water vapor before it reaches matur-
| ity. Thus we see that the conserva-
| ton Of forests and the settling up of
a country conduce to moisture con-
dition of the atmosphere, and, as
have already shown, a moist condition
of the atmosphere conduces to more
dew and more rain.
Years ago dew was rare occur
renee and when we did happen to
discover any we would call out the
whole family to look at it. Nowadays
we have SO much dew and so many
damp nights In June that we usually
wait until July before cutting our al
falfa. which we used to put up two
weeks earlier.
/ AAS WCdtACA UuACou pSOpAS gCOuISuu
that wet and dry weather comes in
cycles and that it will become dry
again before long. However, | have
never been able to discover any evil
tance yet that the difference amount.
ed to more than an inch or so, or that
any of these dry cycles have ever
been too dry to raise crops. In fact,
many men, myself among the num-
Der, have raised crops every year for
80, and some. for 40 years, without a
failure, dry cycles or wet cycles, but
of one thing feel certain, that in
years to come our dry cycles will not
be SO dry. and our wet cycles wetter
than ever. for sooner or later all Of
this atmospheric moisture must and
i will make itself felt.
Stir the Soil Some More.
How many civilizations Of crop is
necessary! Well, just as many as the
ground will permit of, rather than as
few as possible. The original prepa.
ration of the land and the planting is
much more than half the work and
expense up to the time OF harvest. 1t