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Show Forest ServiceMakes Heavy Cut In Stock Grazing Use By Ncthclla Griffin Have you ever seen eighteen men being informed of their imminent financial ruin? It is not a good sight I saw it last Monday when Wayne Cloward, assistant supervisor of the Dixie -National Forest delivered tho Service's edict unofficially, he said; the official word will como next fall, that grazing permits' are to be cut seventy per cent, that being the extent that they find our rango is overgrazed, Beginning , In 1961 permits will be cut twenty percent each year until the seventy percent is reached. This will happen unless we ask for and are granted a range Improvement program that would entail removing fifty percent of the cattle for fivo years, If tho program is granted by the government department and if It results In "Increased carrying capacity" I of the range, a portion of tho permit' may bo re-established. So we have a choice. (Do) you prefer to be shot or hanged?) But these eighteen men are not criminals. They are hard-working ranchers with families and debts. Mdst of theso debts were incurred by buying theso vanishing permits and the "commensurate" land and water necessary to hold the permits. As they listened to the words that cut like a surgeon's knife, the men's shoulders slumped, thelr heads bowed lower, the. muscles of their weather-beaten faces twitched. No one smiled, Several pairs of eyes were red from recent wind exposure. My own eyes grew mclst when I looked at them. They hurled grim questions at the speaker and he threw back answers just as grim. I didn't envy him his job. Why this sudden lowering of- the boom? Previous cuts and range improvement efforts had not been sufficient to do ' any good. What Is back of these demands? Heavier population pressure. More need for water. Heavier population? In Boulder? Since grass makes better watershed than brush, can't brush and aspens be cleared? Brush perhaps, but aspen Is needed for future paper making. Waste baskets full of paper more necessary than beef! t t We don't know yet which choice to make, Can't stand to talk about It. J only hope we can survive. So far, I have bought a small pasture that the owner has been trying to sell me, and I patched both kneg of my jeans and told the secretary of tho associa-tino to report that I am staying. |