REPORT OF THE WESTERN FORESTRY AND CONSERVATION ASSOCIATION
Let us concede that Conservation means that we, as a people, should manage all our resources with the intelligence and prudence that an individual should devote to managing his own property. Let us use them profitably, as he would; neither destroying or wasting them unnecessarily, nor giving them heedlessly to anyone who needs them less and will use them less to our advantage. But let us not, during excursions into Constitutional problems, State rights, and other bewildering issues, forget that first of all comes protection from destruction and waste! The great danger now is that our resources will disappear while we are deciding to whom they shall belong.
It is of this kind of Conservation alone, the Conservation that conserves, that I bring you a message from the Pacific Northwest. The Western Forestry and Conservation Association does not decry the necessity for wise action by State and Nation in the safeguarding of water-power, minerals, and lands; but the settlement of such affairs is not our function. I come only to tell you of the work of the most perfectly organized and successful Conservation movement ever undertaken by private individuals in this country—the forest-protective associations of the Pacific slope. We talk little, but we work, spend money, and accomplish.
In our five States from Montana to California stands half the merchantable timber in the United States, the majority in private hands. The control of this stupendous community resource entails grave responsibilities. To preserve it for the fullest use, to replace it when used, if possible—this is the timber-owner's duty. His ownership is largely a public trust. Nowhere else has he realized this so promptly and acted so adequately as in the Pacific Northwest. I have come to report his stewardship, and to show you that you need not wonder whether he will follow the Conservation banner.
The Western Forestry and Conservation Association has no individual membership. It is the central medium or clearing house for a dozen subsidiary associations of timber-land owners, representing millions of acres, who cooperate in order to apply to the best advantage the most modern and efficient systems of forest protection. Through this means they employ a trained forester to assist them in solving problems of reforestation, forest legislation, education, and like matters demanding expert knowledge or central facilities. Its meetings are attended not only by delegates from these timber-owners' organizations, but also by the leading State and Forest Service officials and representatives of the public Conservation associations. All work in the closest harmony to devise and execute practical and effective policies. There are no dissensions at these meetings; no question as to who is most competent by right of law or geography. Every man there, be he a humble officer of the Forest Service, State Forester, or timber owner, is there because he wants to do his own part, with his own hands or money, in preserving the magnificent forests of the West. He knows what he is talking about, and the rest are mighty glad to hear him.
But we do not stop with meetings, and herein is perhaps our chief difference from a great many advocates of Conservation. You have all read of the recent fires in our northwestern country. They have been greatly exaggerated, the area injured really being very limited. Nevertheless, while we talk here of generalities, bands of weary, half-blind men are still battling to prevent fresh outbreaks; the smoke still curls over the blackened forms of those who met a fearful death to save the lives of others; scores who fought till they could fight no more still lie bandaged and sightless in the extremity of mortal agony. No honor is too great to do these heroes. We of the West owe a sacred debt to them, one and all, and not least to the men of the Forest Service whose training made them as efficient as they were brave. We want more, not fewer, of them. But side by side with the bravest, equally efficient, equally trained and disciplined, worked the patrolmen of our fire associations. Conservationists employed by private effort. We have had no time to prepare nice statistics, for our fire fighters have something else to do; but I venture to say that our Associations' expenditures for forest protection this year will be over $300,000. In the Coeur d' Alene fires alone, a single one of our Associations put 850 men in the field.
And yet this is not much to boast of. There should have been no fires to fight. The way to prevent fire is to prevent it, not fight it when almost or quite beyond control. The only solution of the fire question is better enforcement of better laws, better public sentiment, and better patrol. There must be an organized force of trained and vigilant men, ample in numbers during the dry season to reach all fires in their incipiency. It is in this that our Associations now lead all other agencies. They handle the fire situation in a much better and more comprehensive manner than even the Government has ever done, because they spend three times as much money per acre for patrol. Thoroughly excellent as are the methods in the National Forests—they are identical with those of the most progressive practical timberman—Congress does not sustain them adequately.
Our own system is by no means perfect yet. Although in the territory covered by our Association in Idaho, Washington, and Oregon we have perhaps 500 organized and equipped patrolmen, each authorized to hire help when needed, there is still much unorganized area, and not all timbermen within our territory contribute as they should. We need more men and more money from our own brethren, and heartier cooperation from public, State, and Government. But we confidently expect to get all this, just as we have in greater measure each year in the past. And when, as already in Washington last year, one Association protects 8,000,000 acres with a loss of but 1,000 acres; when this small loss was caused by less than 6 fires out of 1,200 extinguished; when in this historic year of 1910 we have controlled our countless fires so that actual disasters can be counted on the fingers, and our loss as a whole is insignificant—we feel that no one has done more to prove his willingness and competence to practice Conservation that counts than the northwestern forest owner.
The northwestern timberman approves all measures that will give the greatest number of people the greatest permanent opportunity to profit by the fullest use and least waste of all our resources. Thus they will be most prosperous and use most lumber. He is doing more than anyone else, Government or State, to protect both old and growing forests from wasteful destruction, so there may be most lumber to use. I take it this is Conservation.
[Signed] E. T. Allen
Forester