Objections to Wilderness Act as posed by S. 174:

The threat that S. 174 poses, in our opinion, is the blanketing of millions of acres of Federal land which has not been inventoried as to their most useful value to one and all. In order to manage land properly, one must first inventory it. As we have stated we are in favor of certain specific areas of roadless wilderness, provided that each in turn is evaluated as to its greatest use as determined by a commission, through reports on field trips into these areas, studies of economic effect on the areas adjoining, with special attention given those inhabitants who will be most affected. Not just one or two areas, but all areas one at a time in logical, sensible steps.

It appears to us that S. 174 is a negative action bill rather than positive, since no action on the part of Congress, automatically endorses S. 174. Under court ruling, no appropriation of land can be made for any purpose, but by authority of Congress, and we who are most concerned object to Congress giving away this authority to the executive branch of our Government or anyone else.

Let us now then take a closer look at the problems the average man encounters while enjoying the unmarred, untrammeled beauty of blanket wilderness areas.

First, we must consider the means by which he shall travel-no roads, so he hires a pack string and horses if he is to make a prolonged stay of more than one or two nights. Unless he has the know-how of a forester, the savvy of a good horseman, and an extensive knowledge. of first aid, he would surely have to hire these men and rent the animals, to insure that (1) he doesn't get lost; (2) he takes proper care of the animals; and (3) he doesn't accidently burn down the forest primeval.

Upon arrival he may cut wood, by hand, for his fires, prepare the campsite near a source of water; he may even fish if he desires, but no outboard motors for trolling, or to find the best of the fishing areas; that is, if he had the foresight to pack a boat and oars in the first place. What, then, if some unforeseen accident befalls a member of his party? Unless a doctor is counted among those of his party, he must then travel back by horse or mule with or without the injured person to procure medical aid, and at what risk to the patient?

Is this the type of "safari," then, that the average man will be able to afford? We say "No." Only the wealthy who are sound of body, and the young who have the stamina to carry heavy packs would attempt it for more than one night. The bill then is discriminatory and not in the best interest or financial reach of the majority of sportsmen, nature enthusiasts, or the average citizen.

Further insight into S. 174 also brings out some glaring inconsistencies.

S. 174 is inconsistent with (1) the plan of the President of the United States to develop our natural resources, to provide a neverending supply of raw materials for industry and a reservoir of basic jobs for our increasing population.

The lumber industries, through research of wood residuals, sustained yield cutting of timber, and reforestation of timber lands in conjunction with ever-increasing rise of tree farm acreage, has been utilizing this plan for 25 years. Inconsistent with the act of June 4, 1897, which establishes the management policy for national forests, inconsistent because the bill would nullify the established policy of

Congress, that national parks and forests are for use and enjoyment of all the people who own them, not just a privileged few.

Other hazards of H.R. 174:

Blanket wilderness systems, if created, could cause dislocation and migration of population from many Western States that have developed an economy based upon the land for almost a century-a great deal of it being Federal land.

Federal lands at the present time contribute very important revenues to local government via the portion of receipts from national forests paid to the counties and the portion of receipts from mineral resources paid the State.

Oregon and California benefited greatly in fiscal year ending 1960. According to U.S. Forest Service figures, Oregon gross National Forest Service receipts were $50,516,818. Oregon's 25 percent return amounted to $12,629,207. California's gross U.S. Forest Service receipts amounted to $23,203,580; California's 25 percent return was $5,800,895, or a combined net return to both States of $18,430,102. The above figures do not include Oregon and California land-grant lands or public domain, controlled by the Federal Government.

This great western portion of our Nation, with a few exceptions. is the area most rapidly growing. To blanket and create single-use land systems ignores our problem of increasing population. Increased population means more jobs must be created, more food raised, more homes built, watersheds protected, more utilization of all our natural resources, and yet S. 174 proposes to lock up vast areas of unsurveyed, and virtually unexplored lands, even in view of our increasing need for natural resources.

All of our forests in the West contain overripe trees that should be harvested to make way for young vital second-growth trees. Under a lockup blanket wilderness area program, what happens in these areas to the ripe trees, to young growth? To answer these questions I must inquire if any of you are familiar with the term "blowdown sale"?

Briefly, it is a timber tract put up for sale where large volumes of trees have been blown over by the wind. The trees fall because they are overripe or dead either from age, or bug infestation. The tract is put up for sale for two reasons: (1) to salvage all possible footage from the fallen trees; and (2) to protect the surrounding areas from further damage or bug infestation. Locked-up forest lands are not immune to old age, disease, or fire. S. 174 would let the trees fall, smashing undergrowth and toppling other healthy trees, simply for want of proper forest management, of which roads and machinery are a necessity. This is not conservation-it is waste.

Now then what about fire hazards to those areas? I believe all or most of you by now have read accounts of the Sleeping Child wilderness fire which consumed more than 32,000 acres of timberlands. The fire triggered by a lightning strike in August was not entirely put under control until late September and then it was still blazing in a score of areas, 30 days after the strike, and scattered across a dozen

mountains.

Everett Miller, chief forester of Montana Forest Products, Inc., of Phillipsburg, Mont., was quoted as saying:

If we'd had roads, we could have stopped it-certainly held the damage down in spite of wind.

Miller has worked in the woods for over a quarter of a century and also fought the Tillamook burn.

Miller was further quoted:

That country up there has never been logged. There's dead timber all over it. When the heat got to those old snags, they just exploded. Some of the boys thought they were being bombed. The less experienced fighters were really worried when the wind would bring the fire leaping at them with a loud roar.

I included a copy on my report. I know it cannot be accepted. Mrs. PrOST. It will be placed in the file.

Mr. LAUSMANN. Thank you very much.

A conservative estimate of timber lost would be in excess of 55 million board feet, in a fire which consumed up to 4,000 acres daily. Dollar loss of the predominant specie, lodgepole pine, was estimated at $6 million.

Miller went on to say:

It'll be a good month before any of the men who worked on the fire will be in shape to handle their normal work again. The man can recover all right, but it will be a hundred years before the forest comes back. I hope we've all learned some lessons from this mess. Nature just isn't equipped to protect herself-it takes our help.

The fact that this fire was stopped at all indicates the close cooperation between forest services and private enterprise. Shall we have another of these fiascos due to land tieup? We hope to God we don't. Portions of the above quotations were taken from Western Equipment & Timber News, of which copies are hereto attached, and to which we have already referred as being included in the file. Section 9, page 19, of S. 174 (the Alaska section):

In studying S. 174 further, we were quite surprised to discover that Alaska, 90 percent federally owned, is eliminated from the overall blanketing by S. 174 of that State's Federal land. It is fortunate for Alaska that this is so. However, we feel that in order to be equitable to all States concerned, the qualifying 90 percent referred to in section 9 should be reduced to 30 percent, and land-use commission set up for all qualifying States. What properly applies to Alaska should properly and reasonably apply to us.

Therefore, the Sierra Cascade Logging Conference sincerely believes S. 174 to be detrimental, unconstitutional, discriminatory, and contrary to the multiple-use concept of Federal land use and recommends on behalf of our future generations that S. 174 not be enacted. Thank you.

Mrs. PrOST. Are there questions?

If not, our next witness is Mr. Roland Case Ross.
You may proceed, Mr. Ross.

STATEMENT OF ROLAND CASE ROSS, EDUCATIONAL DIRECTOR,
DESOMOUNT CLUB, PASADENA, CALIF.

Mr. Ross. Madam Chairman and members of the House committee, friends of conservation, and enemies alike, my name is Roland Ross, and I am employed as a naturalist in one of the California colleges. I do speak, however, not for the college, I speak for the Desomount Club, a camping club whose purpose is the enjoyment and the appreciation of the natural wilderness under guidance of professionals. This is why I am in the club-I am one of the professionals.

77350-62-pt. 3-5

May I speak, therefore, to one thing that has not been mentioned this morning, that is, something other than food for the gut, or food for the hurt. There are other kinds of food in this world that is food for other men.

I join them in believing that America is great and America is beautiful and America is wonderful, and we have used these gifts. We have also misused these gifts. Ninety-eight percent has been used for the boys who have been in the predominance and they have had fun. We have let the pigs run. It is time to say stop before the pigs get it all. The right time is now when there is something left.

Multiple use is not endorsed at all by scientists as a way to preserve the history of our past. It is not endorsed by historians who would like to have the unborn America see what made it great, see a little bit of untouched prairie. It has taken years to define a piece of untouched prairie. To find a piece of virgin timber has taken research.

We do have declared on paper some wilderness areas. Many have been already violated or, let us say, property utilized in the terms of our friends here who have no other language but that which is profit. Man after man has spoken here to his own gain. These men have interests. These men are Americans and they are good Americans, and they have engaged in our so-called development. There is a point at which to draw the line, and this is the stopping point. There is a line that must be drawn, that must be adhered to in their further use. Less than 2 percent is left that we can show my child and yours and the unborn America what made us great.

I want to speak to the summary statement the club has presented. The first thought is that mankind today is at its highest, we feel. We can also say the wilderness is at its lowest in America and total destruction for mankind and the wilderness is imminent, and right now in view. These are two possible destructions, and we are trying to solve one of them here and now by men of action and women of courage. It is not tomorrow that America the beautiful is to be preserved, it is today.

We have monuments to extinct forms of life, we have a national monument to show us what a Yosemite once looked like. We have preserves, we have so-called wilderness and wild areas, and we had reserves recently violated by oil exploring to the complete destruction of the refuge and preservative act.

We need to rescue now the real and the primitive and the unspoiled while we have it, for we will not have it any longer. You have seen them. They are here cattlemen, mineral men, all honorable, all normal Americans. We are simply saying there is another kind of American; furthermore, there is an unborn American and we speak in behalf of him.

We speak in behalf of these points:

First, if we save the wilderness now, we have some immediate use permitted under this marvelous and orderly act. We will have practical as well as cultural uses. We will have earthy uses permitted under this and we will have spiritual-they laugh, and it is here on record-we will have spiritual uses as real values.

I have seven points which I can cover in 1 minute.

We say: (1) Check areas for science to understand how America ever grew, naturally, physically, and economically.

(2) We will have a basic resource free from present exploitation until, in the words of our oil man, Mr. Van Vleck-no, another oilman who said we have got to get in and look this over very carefully. This is exactly what the bill allows us to do. This gives us a basic reserve of untouched resource.

(3) We do have recreation. That is only one point.

(4) We do have re-creation of urban man by his chance to get into solitude and to have unspoiled views and to hear the original music of nature, and to see the natural providences of life that made America great. There was not anything else that made us great. It was not just men. It was men, good men, in the midst of natural property. (5) Historic evidences of America's struggle and growth and success are written in this story.

(6) Teachers and laboratories for future learning.

Finally, we will have in this act living monuments, not dead ones; we will have mementos and samples of the wild, original America, undeveloped, unexplored, and definitely nonprogressive.

As a naturalist, a last word to the boys who are so afraid of the bugs, so afraid of the fire, who have some idea man made America great: Before we had firefighters, before we had borate, before we had DDT, we knew, we naturalists knew, America was pure and clean and undefiled and very, very successful. This is what we want, a little fence around to keep the bug-boys out, to keep the fire worms out, to keep the developers out, and to let nature do just what it did in the last 50 million years, make a beautiful America.

Thank you. [Applause.]

Mrs. Prost. Are there questions of Mr. Ross?
Mr. Ross. I would love to take them on.

Mrs. Prost. There are no questions, apparently.

Mr. Ross. No takers?

Mrs. ProST. Without objection, the statement filed by Mr. Ross on behalf of the Desomount Club will be made part of the record at this point.

(The statement of the Desomount Club follows:)

Hon. WAYNE N. ASPINALL,

DESOMOUNT CLUB, Sacramento, Calif., November 6, 1961.

Chairman, House Committee on Interior and Insular Affairs:

A supporting statement from the Desomount Club, a camping clubs whose purpose is "the study, enjoyment, and appreciation of nature under professional leadership."

Honorable ladies and gentlemen of the committee, total destruction is possible for mankind for wilderness.

Mankind at its highest, wilderness at its lowest, can pass with laisses faire attitudes.

This is the time for action, protective, forward-looking action.

America the beautiful, its varied lands, waters, climates made us great. Great land, great country, great men.

We have enough monuments to extinct passenger pigeons (forest life) heath hens (prairie life). We have enough memories of vanished clear air, clear streams, grand scenes, thronging abundance of wildlife, that once was-and is no more.

Right now we need to rescue and forever preserve what we have left of the real, the primitive, the unspoiled wilderness.

Real values are immediate as well as future, practical as well as cultural, earthy as well as spiritual.

(1) Check areas for scientific study of the natural.