year, and which we anticipate they will do in the next fiscal year. which we are now estimating for.

Mr. BUCHANAN. We are not exactly keeping faith with those contributors. They contributed $75,000 when we made a large appropriation and they still contributed $75,000 when we cut our appropriation more than half.

Doctor TAYLOR. They have maintained their contributions a little in excess of the required amount.

BLISTER RUST CONTROL

Mr. BUCHANAN. The next item is:

Blister-rust control: For applying such methods of eradication or control of the white-pine blister rust as in the judgment of the Secretary of Agriculture. may be necessary, including the payment of such expenses and the employment of such persons and means in the city of Washington and elsewhere, in cooperation with such authorities of the States concerned, organizations, or individuals as he may deem necessary to accomplish such purposes, and in the discretion of the Secretary of Agriculture no expenditures shall be made for these purposes until a sum or sums at least equal to such expenditures shall have been appropriated, subscribed, or contributed by State, county, or local authorities, or by individuals or organizations for the accomplishment of such purposes, $375,233. Provided, That no part of this appropriation shall be used to pay the cost or value of trees or other property injured or destroyed.

WORK UNDER THIS APPROPRIATION

Doctor TAYLOR. Under this appropriation campaigns are conducted for the suppression and control of white-pine blister rust by cooperating with State organizations, counties, towns, individual landowners, and with the Forest Service and National Park Service in the eradication of Ribes (currants and gooseberries) which serve as carriers of the disease, as well as in the application of measures to delay the. spread of the disease into uninfected regions; and through experi-. mentation and investigation to develop better control measures.

Eastern control program: Under this project, the department is cooperating in the control of blister rust with the affected States and through them with individuals, townships, and other local agencies. Formal or informal cooperation is maintained with the infested States of Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Wisconsin, Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia, Ohio, and Iowa. In this work the department provides the leadership. and coordination of the control activities and the States and their cooperators supply the supervision and labor. Also, cooperation is given the National Park Service and Forest Service in the form of technical leadership and assistance in control work on lands under their administration and the Bureau of Plant Quarantine in aiding nurseries to meet the provisions of Federal Quarantine 63. The eastern control program is essential to assure the productivity of white pine forests containing standing timber valued at over $126,000,000 to preserve regional timber, scenic and recreational white. pine values of great economic importance, to protect thousnds of acres of young growth which will form the next timber crop, to maintain control of the disease on initially protected pine lands aggregating 8,500,000 acres, and to apply control measures on the remaining 42 per cent of the pine acreage as yet unprotected.

Western control program: The work under this project is located in the States of California, Idaho, Montana, Oregon, and Washington,

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Formal or informal cooperation is maintained with the affected States. In this work the department assists the cooperating States and local agencies in the application of control measures on state and privately owned lands and furnishes leadership and coordination of the control activities. The forest lands are in mixed ownership and control can be accomplished only by combining and coordinating the efforts of all owners into a single program of action. Cooperation in the form of technical leadership and assistance is given the Forest Service in protecting valuable white pines in the national forests, to the National Park Service in protecting valuable areas of white pine in the national parks, and to the Bureau of Plant Quarantine in connection with Federal Quarantine 63. The blister rust control program in the western United States is essential to assure the productivity of forest lands bearing western white and sugar pine timber valued at $288,000,000 to maintain industries dependent upon the white pines that represent 50 per cent of the business of the western white pine region as well as valuable economic and business interests in the sugar pine region of California, to protect millions of acres of young growth that will form the next timber crop, to prevent forced timber cutting and demoralization of the Nation's lumber markets, to maintain control of the disease in areas already protected and to apply control measures to the remaining unprotected areas. Only about 2 per cent of the pine acreage in the West is protected from the rust at present.

Mr. BUCHANAN. Taking up the subject of blister rust control, in 1933 you had $400,000, and that is reduced down to $375,233. Now, just explain that reduction.

Doctor TAYLOR. That reduction is entirely on account of the continuation of the legislative furlough, $24,767 from $400,000, leaving the estimate for 1934, $375,233.

Mr. BUCHANAN. This appropriation now is divided into two sections of the country, as I understand it.

Doctor TAYLOR. Yes, sir.

Mr. BUCHANAN. The western and the eastern section.

Doctor TAYLOR. Yes, sir.

WORK BEING DONE IN EASTERN AREA

Mr. BUCHANAN. And you estimate for use for eastern control $192,000 and western control $208,000 for the next fiscal year? Doctor TAYLOR. Yes, sir.

Mr. BUCHANAN. I wish you would explain conditions in both sections and why the division as you have it?

Doctor TAYLOR. The first reason for the division of this into east and west is primarily due to the fact that we are dealing two with distinct and different forest regions. From the Great Lakes, that is, from Minnesota eastward to the Atlantic, we have the eastern white pine species, the old white pine which has been the best timber of the North and East since the white man came to this country.

Mr. BUCHANAN. And the most susceptible to this rust? Doctor TAYLOR. I wish I could say that, but unfortunately the western pines are proving much more susceptible.

Mr. BUCHANAN. That is the same species of pine?

Doctor TAYLOR. No; these are different species; but they are all 5-leaf pines and susceptible to the blister rust. This eastern pine is the pine which caused Maine to be called the "Pine Tree State," and

which was the preferred lumber of New England and New York and Wisconsin and Michigan and Minnesota; and which proved susceptible to this disease when the rust got in from Europe on small pine trees imported for reforestation purposes before there was any legislation authorizing a quarantine.

In fact, before the economic importance of the disease was recognized even in Europe, for our white pine does not occur in Europe except as it has been planted there. So that its susceptibility and the danger to our forests were not recognized as commercially important till the disease got here. The white pine of the East-the old white pine-is practically exhausted so far as virgin stands are concerned. But in New England and New York white pine, mostly self-seeded as a volunteer crop on land which has been logged off and on worn-out farm lands has become an important source of income to the States and communities, and to the individual farmers, who have white pine lots on their places which they harvest at the age of 40 to 50 years as merchantable timber. The species is so valuable in our manufacturing and in our building that most of the States in that region are using it extensively in their reforestation plantings. That also is being done now extensively, farther west, where reforestation is practicable. That is the case in Michigan and to a less extent in Wisconsin and Minnesota; but the old white pine is now substantially in the status of either a voluntary or deliberately planted crop which is being handled as a source of income to farmers and in some cases to timberland owners and investors, and also in the State as well as the Federal forest reserves.

Mr. BUCHANAN. Have you any reasonable estimate of the area of the white-pine belt from Minnesota east?

Doctor TAYLOR. I can give you that, but I have not the figures here. It amounts to a good many million acres. My recollection is that there are estimated to be somewhere about 15,000,000 acres of actual eastern white pine first, and a potential acreage at least equal to this that eventually will be reforested with white pine.

Mr. BUCHANAN. If you feel like correcting that any when you go to correct your remarks, you may correct it.

Doctor TAYLOR. In this eastern region where white pine has the status of a crop, the farmers and municipalities and States recognize its value so clearly that they are cooperating in controlling the rust through the eradication of the currant and gooseberry bushes, which are the intermediate hosts of this white pine blister disease. Mr. BUCHANAN. To what extent?

Doctor TAYLOR. In many cases they more than match the expenditures in the Eastern States. We can put the figures in the record. Expenditures for blister-rust-control work by Bureau of Plant Industry and cooperating States and local organizations

Blister-rust cooperative expenditures, Bureau of Plant Industry

This includes $46,000 for State and private cooperation on 2 for 1 basis, $34,010 for cooperation with Forest Service on Federal lands, and the remainder for developing control methods and determining yearly spread of the rust.

Mr. BUCHANAN. And have been doing it for some years, have they not?

Doctor TAYLOR. And have been doing it for some years; yes, sir. So far as we have information of trends they are practically certain to do that even in these difficult times. The money has to be either tax money or contributions by individuals, and in these expenditures for protecting the white pine they are realizing the value of every dollar they have to raise.

Mr. BUCHANAN. How are you getting along with the work?

Doctor TAYLOR. The work is proceeding very satisfactorily in the East. We feel that the white pine resources of that territory, particularly east of Lake Michigan, are in good shape. West of Minnesota is the stretch of practically timberless plains in which there is no white pine till you reach the Rockies. When you reach Idaho, we have the finest virgin white pine timber that ever was on this continent, and there we have a very serious blister rust emergency at this time.

Mr. BUCHANAN. I know you are destroying these small currant bushes. With the present program carried forward, how long do you think it will be before you will get to the state where this appropriation can be substantially reduced?

Doctor KELLERMAN. We are more than half done in the East. Mr. BUCHANAN. Are you following up in those areas that have been cleared?

Doctor KELLERMAN. The control work done on a tract has to be checked over about once in every five years, and that can be done by the States and timber owners just as rapidly as control work becomes a regularly established feature of forest management. After the second and third reviews of the control areas, we will probably have no more hand in it. We can probably work faster now than in the beginning, so that in the next eight or ten years it appears probable we can maintain present control accomplishment and, in addition, protect the 42 per cent of the pine area on which no work has yet been done.

Mr. BUCHANAN. Why?

Doctor KELLERMAN. Because we have learned more about how to get cooperation and can lead the work more efficiently, so that the money will stretch over larger areas than at the beginning. We should be able to complete the major objective of the eastern control program in less time than the 16 years required to do 58 per cent of the task from the beginning of the work up to now-perhaps in half of that time.

WORK BEING DONE IN WESTERN AREA

Mr. BUCHANAN. Alright, let us go to the western area.

Doctor TAYLOR. West of the Great Plains we reach what is known as the western white pine, the Pinus monticola of Idaho, eastern Washington and western Montana. Then as we go southward through Oregon and California, we find the sugar pine, which is one of the important commercial white pines. Both the western white pine and the sugar pine are proving much more susceptible to the disease than the eastern white pine; therefore, the hazard of swift economic loss is greater than it is with the eastern white pine. We have a more difficult situation out there, also, in that the topography is rougher. It is mountains and valleys and rocks, and a more difficult situation physically to clear the land of the currants. We have this rather radical difference, also, that certain currants and gooseberries-the wild ones, occur in denser and larger concentrations than anywhere in the East. This is particularly true in the stream valleys where certain of the wild currants and gooseberries occupy practically the whole floor of the valley. While there is no pine mixed with them down in the stream bottoms, the adjacent slopes that rise from those creek bottoms carry the very best of the white pine stand that is found there. Therefore, the Idaho white pine is now in very serious danger from the heavy rust infection which is certain to occur within the next three of four years from the currant and gooseberry populations of the stream valleys. In the West we have this difference, also, in the ownership situation, that the Federal Government owns approximately forty per cent of the western white and sugar pine stumpage. While a good deal of that is in solid forest reserves-solid bodies of federally owned white pine that can be protected by the Federal agencies, a larger proportion of Federal, State, and private pine lands are interlaced and interlocked, so that we have the problem of mixed ownership which makes development of financial cooperation upon any rigidly definite basis difficult to work out. The long-distance