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now is to face conditions as they are, profiting so far as we can bring ourselves to do it, by the experience of Europe. We cannot delay longer planning soundly and working effectively for the renewing of our forests, our soils and our waters.

Sound Land Policy Needed in New York.

Three hundred years of agricultural history in New York have brought us to a fairly permanent definition of agriculture. It means not alone the growing of a crop of grain, but the production of food and draft animals; the manufacture of the crude products of the farm, as in the dairy industry; and finally the marketing of farm produce. Forestry is a soil problem just as is agriculture and before we can develop a sound land policy we must recognize just as broad a definition of forestry as there is of agriculture.

Forestry means not alone the growing of a crop of trees from the soil; it means as well the protection and propagation of the wild life of the forest and forest waters; it means the proper utilization and marketing of the products of the forest. Already the older European countries which have been forced by density of population to develop forest lands equally as effectively as agricultural lands, have accepted this broad definition of forestry and are using it to the great benefit of those nations, not alone in direct financial returns but in indirect returns. Nearly 300 years of agriculture in this country have shown that the farmer or agriculturist will do little for the forest. His own problems are big enough and difficult enough. Agriculture and forestry are not the same and neither is dependent upon the other. They are, however, co-ordinate in that they are both soil problems and applied together as they are in the older European countries they will come as near as man can come to the solving of our soil problems.

Recent Attempts to Belittle Value of Forest Cover in This Country.

Within the past year or two such men as Gen. H. M. Chittenden, a retired Army Officer, and Dr. Willis L. Moore, former Chief of the U. S. Weather Bureau, have occupied some considerable newspaper space in writing of "The Myth of the Forest" and of "Forests and Dry Weather," with the idea of showing that there is no definite relation between forests and water or forests and the other natural conditions

existent over our land surface. General Chittenden and the others write as if each force in nature could act independently of other forces. Studies made by meteorologists, physicists and foresters in Europe have proven repeatedly that there is a very intimate relation between such forces in nature as vegetation, soil, water and the air. Even the great cyclonic movements of the atmosphere which are too universal to be affected by local forest or water cover are dependent upon the larger earth activities of which they are a part, such as earth movement, and en masse cover of the ocean and land. A great deal is said of the influence or lack of influence of forest cover without distinguishing at all between such forests as those of the Adirondacks and the open parklike forests of the Rockies.

Dr. Willis L. Moore in a recent statement entitled "Forests and Dry Weather," put out by the National Editorial Service, Inc., attempts to show that the increasing interest in right use of forests and waters is due to the righteous indignation of our people at the monopolization of much of the nation's wealth of land and forest and water power. Dr. Moore would have us believe that experience, good business sense and applied science in this country have played no part in the development of forestry by the National Government and the State during the past quarter century. There is no doubt but that extravagant claims have been made as to the value of the forest in influencing climate and in increasing water supply. However, the experiments and studies of French, German and Russian scientists as well as scientific men in this country show beyond all question that there is an intimate relation between all factors of soil, forest and waters.

Mr. Raphael Zon, Chief of Forest Investigations of the U. S. Forest Service, in a very carefully prepared report on "Forests and Water in the Light of Scientific Investigations," which is Appendix 5 of the final report of the National Waterways Commission, shows beyond question that both investigation and experience prove the necessity for covering forest land throughout the country with forests, not alone because of the direct money returns that may be secured, but because they will have a beneficial influence upon runoff of water produced by rain or snow in other ways; that they will affect the temperature of the air to a limited extent although in the aggregate they may have very great influence.

In completing his statement on "Forests and Dry Weather," Dr. Moore would have us believe that cement, stone and metal will take the place of wood and that we really do not need the forests except to adorn the landscape and to provide shade and shelter. He says in part: "It is logical to assume that it is a matter of but a few hundred years when the United States will be as densely populated as China is today.-Cement, stone and metal will be almost exclusively used in building operations. Houses will be warmer in winter and cooler in summer, and may be easily and frequently treated with antiseptics. Then trees will only grow wild in inaccessible places or on surfaces that will not produce nutritious crops. Otherwise they will not be allowed to exist unless they bear fruits or nuts, or furnish beautifully colored and grained woods for decoration; or are planted to adorn the landscape and provide shade and shelter. They will not be needed for fuel. The blowing of the wind, the ebb and flow of the tides, or the utilization of direct sunshine, will supply man with an abundance of heat and power." It may be safe for the dreamer to make what he believes to be logical assumptions as to what will occur several hundred years ahead but it is unsafe for any scientific man to prophesy what may take place in the next two hundred years in this country. The results of industrial and commercial development in Europe and America during the past 50 years show that the uses of wood are being increased because of better knowledge as to how and where to use it. With all the use of cement and steel, the fact remains that the lumber bill of the State of New York for the past two or three years has averaged annually more than a hundred million of dollars. So long as the State of New York is consuming so much wood the forests of the State and surrounding states will have a very direct influence upon our industrial development, to say the least.

The fact that Dr. Moore predicts the covering of non-agricultural lands with forests which will offer shade and shelter as well as adorn the landscape is an acknowledgement that the forests have an influence in the way of shade and shelter. If the ground is sheltered by forest there can be no other result than that the soil, as a result of the cover, will be less subject to the drying effects of sun and wind, that water will run off more slowly from the surface and by the maintaining of a more even temperature the humidity in the air next the surface will be higher.

That is, with the soil covered with forest there is a very intimate and beneficial relation between that soil and the forest and the air in the forest.

Great Catastrophes in Nature Occur Regardless of Man. Floods, great windfalls in the forest and great forest fires occurred when all of the eastern states were covered largely with virgin forest and these catastrophes in nature may reoccur whenever extraordinary meteorological conditions combine with careless action on man's part. Increasing population, increasing stress in all of our economic and industrial relations means that there will not be the careless action on man's part in the future in his treatment of natural resources that has occurred so often and with such disastrous results in the past. The tremendous development of transportation not alone in New York but throughout this country means more complete utilization of all of the products of the forest. New York is surrounded by waterways and soon will have the Barge Canal completed, making it possible to bring in lumber and other products of the forest from all sections of the State and the country by water, to the centers of population. The necessity for conservation of water for industrial as well as potable use means that man will give increasing care not alone to the agricultural soil which has in the past been given his first consideration, but to the water and forest conditions as well.

All of New York a Great Watershed.

All of New York is a great watershed or series of watersheds. The amount, location and condition of agricultural lands in this State are almost as vital in the consideration of present and future supply of water as the amount and condition of the forest lands. Forestry, like agriculture, is a soil question, and the conditions of the surface of the soil whether it be covered with forest, with agricultural crops or absolutely barren will be the important question in our efforts to conserve the waters of the State. Therefore the people of the State must change somewhat their conception of what is a watershed. Agricultural lands that are too steep or too poor for the satisfactory practice of agriculture should be covered promptly with a growing forest. Before this can be even begun there must be a definite land policy for the State. Such a policy is absolutely essential before real progress will be made in the

solution of the soil and water problems. The development of the agricultural lands of the State has been carried out in a very haphazard way in that the question of what lands should be cleared and tilled has been left entirely to the private owner. If the State is to protect itself in the way of having satisfactory supply of water for its industries, for navigation and for potable use, to say nothing of a reasonably permanent supply of wood for the paper and other industries dependent upon the forest, it means the formation of a definite policy for the handling of both State and privately owned lands. Owing to the attitude of our people toward State control of privately owned lands it is probable that it will be some time before progress is made in protecting the public against the abuse of such lands by their owners. However, the State should formulate constructive policies for State owned lands.

New York is very fortunate in owning about a million, eight hundred thousand acres of forest lands in the Adirondacks and Catskills. As yet no definite plans looking forward to the future have been announced for these lands nor is there a definite policy for the privately owned lands in the Adirondacks and Catskills, the clearing of which may affect detrimentally the water courses of the State. Out of fairness to the private owners of the Adirondacks and Catskills, such a policy should be formulated and carried out in conjunction with the development of a definite State forest policy. Until the State itself takes the lead in the proper development of its forests and waters little can be expected from the private owner.

In direct proportion to the increasing of the value of the forest for the production of lumber, paper wood and derived products there will be an ever increasing value of the forest as a conserver of water, as a home for fish and game and as a great playground for all the people of the State. The direct value of the forest for lumber and paper wood is not in opposition-as some would have us think-to the indirect value of the forest as a home for game and as a recreation place. Cover the Adirondacks with such a forest as the Black Forest of Western Germany, which is made up of trees of all ages and all sizes naturally produced, and we will have a better game and recreational forest than we now have in the Adirondacks and at the same time may secure sufficient direct returns to at least make the forests pay for themselves.

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