The Republican journal., 1915-08-12
Farmers Depend on Forests.
Forest Service Asserts Destruction of
Woods Means Loss of Local Markets.

Woods Means Loss of Local Markets.
In regions where timber is the most
| important natural resource permanent
| forests managed with view to sustain
ed timber production are absolutely es-
sential to the continuance of agriculture,
| according to an article in the Year Book
| of the U. S. Department of Agriculture,
just published. The result of exploiting
the timber without thought of the fu-
ture is the final disappearance of lumber
ing operations and therefore the with
draWal of an important local market for
farm products. In addition, forest fires
often ravage the cut-over lands and thus
preclude the development of new local
market by the resumption Of numbering;
for after fire there is no chance for
new crop of trees.
From region where productive tim
berland has been converted into a bar
rem waste, the farmers usually have to
move out. There are parts of the Unit
ed States in which cultivation of the soil
has ended with the cessation of local
numbering, or at least shortly afterward,
because with the withdrawal of the
woods-workers went the farmers mar
ket for meats, vegetables, hay and grain.
There are other regions where the sta
bility of local agriculture is absolutely
bound up with forest protection. This
is strikingly true in parts of the Appa-
lachian mountains of the East; it is no
less true in many of the national forest
regions of the West.
A few years ago, continues the arti-
Gle, more than hundred farmers in Mon
tana petitioned against the then propos-
ed elimination Of their section from the
Kootenai National Forest. Its elimina-
ton they knew, from the history of adj
jacent land outside the forest, would
mean that il would at once be taken up
by timber spectators and lumber COM
panies to be held for years without de-
velopment. They knew also that if this
came about, neighbors could not be OBJ
tanned or road and schools be developed
in the county as rapidly as if the land
remained under government control, by
which the portions really more suitable
for agriculture than for forest purposes
would in time be entered by permanent
settlers under the Forest Homestead
Act
In 1911, an association of Colorado
farmers, who irrigated their farms with
water from the North Platte river, sent
an urgent request to the government to
restrict timber cutting on the North
Platte watershed, so that, as far as pos
sible, high spring freshets could be pre-
vented and more water made available
for irrigation during the summer months,
when the crops were most in need. They
said that they relied upon the national
forest, within which the watershed lay,
to ensure steady flow of water for their
crops.
The national forests, says the article,
besides being the American farmers
most valuable source of wood, which is
the chief building material for rural pur-
poses, are also his most valuable source
of water, both for irrigation and domes-
tic use. In the West, they afford him a
protected grazing range for his stock;
they are the best insurance against flood
damage to his fields, his buildings, his
bridges, his roads, and the fertility of
his soil. The national forests cover the
higher portions of the Rocky Mountain
ranges, the Cascades, the Pacific Coast
ranges, and large part of the forested
coast and islands of Alaska; some of the
billy regions in Montana and in the Da-
kotas. Oklahoma and Arkansas, and lin.
tied areas in Minnesota, Michigan, Flor
ida and Porto Rico. In addition, land is
now being purchased for national for
! ests in the White Mountains of New
England and in the southern Appalach-
ians. In regions so widely scatter d,
agricultural and forest conditions neces-
sarily differ to great degree, bringing
about corresponding differences in the
i effect Of the national forests on the ag-
! ricultural interests of the various locali-
] ties. Wherever agriculture can be
| practiced, however, the farmer is direct
ly benefited by the existence of national
forests and by their proper manage
| ment.