Part 22 (1/2)

At the present time the destruction of our forests and serious injury to the water supply has been threatened through the organization of large lumber companies. Those interested in lumbering usually live far removed from the scenes of their operations, and consequently care little about the condition in which the deforested lands are left.

The farmers were the first permanent occupants of the West. Unlike the wandering trappers and miners, they established homes and made the land richer instead of poorer. As long as the population was scanty there was not much danger of exterminating the wild animals, and the demands for timber were small.

Our forefathers who settled the Eastern states had to contend with the forests. Nearly every acre of ground had to be laboriously cleared before anything could be planted. It was only natural that they should come to regard the forests as a hindrance rather than a blessing.

As the settlers spread westward to the prairies and plains they came upon a region almost dest.i.tute of forests; but still farther, in the mountains of the continental divide and the Pacific slope, they again found extensive forests. To them it seemed impossible that these forests could ever be exhausted, and therefore little care was taken for their preservation.

As the population increased, more and more lumber was needed for building purposes. Before the sawmill came split lumber was used, and the shake-maker did not hesitate to cut down the largest and most valuable pines on the mere possibility that fifteen or twenty feet of the b.u.t.t would split well enough to make shakes. It made no difference to him that the whole trunk rotted upon the ground.

When the sawmills were built and there came a demand from abroad for lumber, the forests were attacked upon a much larger scale.

The need of the moment was all that concerned the lumbermen, and they took no care for the preservation of the young trees, which in time would have renewed the supply. The litter of the trunks and branches which they left upon the ground furnished fuel for the fires which frequently swept over these areas and killed the remaining growth.

As a result of these fires, the few animals that have escaped the hunters have been killed or driven from their homes, and the forest cover, which would retain much of the moisture and preserve it for the supply of the streams in summer, has been destroyed. The removal of the forest cover leads also to the was.h.i.+ng away of the soil, the shoaling of the streams, floods in spring, and low water in summer. In fact, all the people and industries of the region are affected by its loss. It may take hundreds of years for the country to recover; indeed, if the rainfall is light, the forests may never grow again, without artificial aid.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 130.--A BURNED FOREST, CASCADE RANGE, OREGON]

The careless stockman, seeking to enlarge his pastures by burning the underbrush, sets fires which often destroy hundreds of square miles of forest. The summer camper and the prospector also frequently go on their way without extinguis.h.i.+ng the camp fire, though a great forest fire may be the result.

Ours is a fertile and productive earth, capable of supporting a mult.i.tude of living things. For ages the lower animals, as well as savage man, lived under the protection of Nature, making the best use of her products of which they were capable; but they never brought about the unnecessary, and often wanton, destruction of which we are guilty,--we, who call ourselves civilized. In killing the wild animals we cannot make the plea of necessity, as can savages who have no other means of support. Likewise, there is no necessity for killing the beautiful singing birds, merely for their plumage.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 131.--EROSION UPON AN UNPROTECTED SLOPE]

The forests are cut away without any thought of the retribution which Nature is sure to bring upon us. They are of vast importance to the well-being of the country and are the natural possession of all its people. We ought not to permit them to be destroyed indiscriminately for the benefit of a few. We need lumber for many purposes; but a careful treatment of the forests with an eye to their continuance, the plan of cutting large trees, and preserving the small ones, is a very different thing from our present wasteful methods.

Every summer the air is filled with the smoke of burning forests, and the lumbermen are at work harder than ever felling virgin forests upon more and more remote mountain slopes.

Books of travel written fifty years ago tell of animal life in such abundance in many portions of the West that we can hardly believe their stories. A description of California written in 1848 mentions elk, antelope, and deer as abundant in the Great Valley.

How many of us living at the present time have ever seen one of these animals in its native haunts?

There is hope now that this wasteful use of Nature's gifts will soon be stopped. Large areas of the mountainous portions of the public domain are being set aside as parks and forest reserves.

The parks contain some of the finest scenery and most wonderful natural curiosities to be found upon the face of the whole earth.

This wild scenery, together with the forests and plants of every kind, as well as the animals and birds that inhabit these areas, are to remain just as they were when the first white man looked upon them.

The parks form asylums for the wild creatures which have been hard pressed for so many years. In the Yellowstone National Park, where they have been protected the longest, the animals have almost lost their fear of man and act as if they knew that they are safe within its limits. In the Yellowstone you may see great herds of elk feeding in the rich meadows; deer stand by the roadside and watch you pa.s.s, while the bears have become so tame about the hotels that they make themselves a nuisance. Sixteen bears at a time have been seen feeding at the garbage pile near the Grand Canon hotel.

The forest reserves differ from the parks in that they are established for utility rather than for pleasure. The forests now existing are to be cared for by the government and to be wisely used when lumber is needed. Fires are to be avoided so far as possible, and burned areas are to be replanted with trees. Another object to be accomplished is the retention of the forests about the heads of the streams so as to preserve the summer water supply. The water runs off more slowly from a slope covered with vegetation than from a barren one, and therefore has more time to soak into the ground. This is a very important matter in all mountainous districts, particularly where the rainfall is light.

The Yellowstone National Park is situated upon the continental divide in northwestern Wyoming. It is largely a plateau, with an elevation of seven thousand to eight thousand feet above the level of the sea. The surface of the plateau is covered with forests, meadows, and lakes; but the region is particularly remarkable for the geysers and hot springs, and the Grand Canon and falls of the Yellowstone River.