Children in particular should have their interest actively aroused and their support enlisted. In one state, "gully clubs" have been organized by the state forester. These are composed largely of school children who take an active part in the work of gully reclamation and particularly in finding and checking incipient gullies before it is too late. Why could not such organizations as boy scouts, girl scouts, and campfire girls be used in the same way? [Footnote: "Farms, Forests, and Erosion," YEAR BOOK of the Department of Agriculture, 1916, pp. 107-134.]
MINERAL RESOURCES
Soil, water, and forests are only a few of the rich natural resources of our country, although they are among the most important. Great as the mineral production of our country now is, we have only begun to open the mineral storehouse. On the other hand, we have been extremely wasteful of some of our minerals, as in the case of natural gas, oil, and coal. The war has done more, perhaps, than anything else to open our eyes to our mineral wealth and to convict us of our wastefulness in the past. In the light of what it has shown us we should redouble our efforts to conserve our resources. Our government has been gradually developing a program of conservation which we should help to make effective. At the end of this chapter will be found references to interesting accounts of our national wealth, and of what the government is doing to conserve it in other directions than those described in this chapter. Many of these references are to publications issued by the government itself, which can be obtained for the asking.
Investigate and report on.
Losses in your state from periodic floods. Measures adopted or proposed to control them.
The by products of coal and of petroleum.
The Forest Service of the Department of Agriculture.
A description of your state forests (if any).
Forestry in your own state, public and private.
Losses from forest fires in your state.