Agriculture, owing to the average high altitude, is a negligible industry in the Reserve, little more being done than to raise a little fruit, grain and vegetables, mainly for home consumption. Naturally there is a fair amount of grazing, almost the whole area of the Reserve being used for this purpose during the summer months. Many portions of meadow-land are used for dairy-herds, most of the hotels and resorts on and near Lake Tahoe having their own herds and meadows. Bands of beef-cattle are also pastured, together with large bands of sheep, the two kinds of stock often grazing in common, the cattle using the meadows and the sheep the ridges and timber-lands. In taking the trail-rides described in other chapters I invariably came across both cattle and sheep, and all the near-by meadows are occupied by the dairy-herds belonging to the hotels. Patented lands of private ownership within the bounds of the Forest are often also leased to cattle- and sheep-men. Last year it was estimated that there were 47,000 head of sheep, and about 6000 head of cattle on the Reserve. Under the protection of the rangers grazing conditions are rapidly improving, the cattle- and sheep-men being held strictly to certain rules laid down by the Supervisor. Systematic efforts are made to rid the Forest, as far as possible, of predatory animals that kill the sheep, also of poisonous plants which render grazing dangerous.
There are far less cattle on the Sierra ranges in the Tahoe region than there are sheep. During the summer most of the mountain valleys have their great sheep-bands. Many are brought over from Nevada, and far more from the Sacramento Valley and other regions near the Pacific. The feed, as a rule, is good and abundant from the time the snow leaves until the end of September or even later. Though the year 1913 was the third dry season (comparatively speaking) the region had suffered, I found a score or more of meadows in my rambles around Tahoe, where thousands of sheep might have had rich and abundant pasture.
But well may John Muir dislike sheep in his beloved Sierras, and term them in his near-to-hatred "the locusts of the mountains." When the most fertile valley has been "fed off" by sheep, or they have "bedded down" night after night upon it, it takes some time before the young growth comes up again.
It is the custom when the lambing season is over, and the lambs are strong enough to travel and old enough to ship, to move to some convenient point on the railway, where there is an abundance of feed and water on the way, and there ship either to Reno, Carson and Virginia City, or to some market on the Pacific Coast. Hence overland travelers on the Southern Pacific trains are often surprised to see vast flocks of sheep and hear the bleating of the lambs at unlooked for stations at the highest points of the Sierra Nevada, as at Soda Springs, Cisco, Emigrant Gap, Blue Canyon, or sidings on the way.
There is a large mining industry within the Reserve. Since 1849 the western part of the Forest has been most active, one county, Sierra, having produced since then upwards of $200,000,000. The present output is much smaller than formerly, still it is large enough to render mining an important factor in the productive wealth of the state. In 1853 hydraulic mining was inaugurated near Nevada City. This gave renewed interest to placer-mining.
Four of the old emigrant roads cross the Tahoe and El Dorado Reserves. The most famous of these is the one across Donner Pass and through Emigrant Gap. This was the general course taken by the unfortunate Donner Party, as recorded in another chapter.
Another road was the Heuness Pass road, on a branch of which was Nigger Tent, a rendezvous of robbers and cutthroats in the early days. Prospectors and miners were often robbed and murdered at this place. The Heuness Pass Road and the Donner Road branch in Sardine Valley, the former going through by Webber Lake, and the latter through the present site of Truckee. On the latter road, in the vicinity of You Bet, is a large tree which bears the name "Frémont's Flagpole," though it is doubtful whether it was ever used by Frémont for this purpose.
The third important road is the present Placerville Road,—a portion of the State Highway and the great trans-continental Lincoln Highway, elsewhere described.
The fourth is the Amador Grade Road, on which stood the tree whereupon Kit Carson carved his name.
The Georgetown Road is an important and historic feature of the Tahoe Region, for it connects Georgetown with Virginia City, and it was from the former place so many Tahoe pioneers came. I have already referred to the trail built in the early 60's. Then when the Georgetown miners constructed a ditch to convey water for mining purposes from Loon Lake, they soon thereafter, about '72 or '73, built a road about forty miles long, to enable them to reach the Lake, which was their main reservoir. Loon, Pleasant and Bixby's Lakes were all dammed and located upon for the water company.