Show FORESTRY A somewhat careful observation of the wasatch mountains in utah county leads me to attach more lm porta port nee anoe than ever before to the subject of forestry but the possibility of again clothing the mountains with timber seems more certain there are at least seven species of trees growing naturally in our mountains which are valuable either for fuel or timber these are two or more species of pine the poplar the maple two species or ol cottonwood cotto awood and one or two species of willows of these the pines the poplar and the maple grow very nearly up to the snow line fast east of Spring springville ville fine groves of poplar are grown at an altitude of between and too feet and most of the canyons in that hat section are lined with trees and bushes from their heads beads to where they open into the valleys in inaccessible places maple and cottonwood trees have grown to te a size which makes them valuable for either fuel or lumber and especially valuable to shade the ground and thereby prevent too rapid evaporation and to act as checks to descending snow enow preventing snow slides the size ize to which these trees have grown indicates that our native trees will attain goodly proportions if they are given an opportunity in hobble creek canyon about three and a half milua above its if mouth is a beautiful grove of native trees the owner has baa simply imply cleared away the brush and judiciously out bob such trees reel as hohas be has needed but bat he has haa out his trees green like an AD owner and not like a vandal the most practical forestry work to begin with would probably be to encourage the growth of trees along the canyon streams this should be done by proper trimming and thinning such trees as are already growing there and gradually setting out trees which experience shows show will profitably grow in such places were this done thousands ot of sorts acres of land which are now useless would be serving a double purpose for they would not only be conserving our water supply but they would be growing into valuable timber fur for use in the near future the next forestry work should be to set out trees around the head waters of the principal irrigating streams in many oases this would be somewhat expensive as it might be necessary to fence several square miles mile of land away from sheep but bat the value of the timber would soon compensate for the expense and even sheep owners would be benefited with the rest for the moot moat valuable sheep feed fad grows on the shaded ground it will be a slow alow and somewhat cult task taik to got get trees started on the bare mountain sides adea probably the most moat practical thing for the near future will be to find some grass grams that will grow in such places and begin the seeding of the mountains moun talma with it it will serve a double purpose furnishing food to stock and keeping the ground loose so that water may readily penetrate it and furnish a sup ply pay for the springs springe I 1 feel sure that thousands of acres of good land in utah are absolutely idle at the present time were this all it would be bad enough but the land la is not only idle it is constantly deteriorating owing to the fertile soil being away should not this bow be changed would it not be better even at some present expense to get as much as possible of our now useless land into trees which will gradually grow into very great value 0 A WHITIN 0 university of utah |