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SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE

COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC LANDS AND SURVEYS
UNITED STATES SENATE

SIXTY-NINTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

PURSUANT TO

S. Res. 347

TO INVESTIGATE ALL MATTERS RELATING TO NATIONAL
FORESTS AND THE PUBLIC DOMAIN AND
THEIR ADMINISTRATION

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дід
1-20-1927

THE STORY OF THE RANGE

WHAT PASTURES MEAN TO THE NATION

Wherever man has set foot on this globe the grazing of domestic animalsfirst the cow and then the horse, sheep, and hog-has been the first form of agriculture practiced. As has been well said, "The cow has always been the advance agent of civilization." With few exceptions she found her whole living in the woods and open places about the pioneers' settlement. Later, as improved pastures were furnished, she harvested the crops herself, and when fat she and her offspring furnished their own transportation to market. Alive she furnished one of the most nourishing foods known; dead she furnished meat and wearing apparel.

Pasturage for livestock has always been an indispensable source of commodities essential to life. To-day, in spite of all our intensive agricultural e practices, the production of meat, hides, and wool by grazing animals is the cheapest, most economical method known. With comparatively little attention from the owners, the grazing animals harvest and store away the forage crops. meantime fertilizing the areas over which they graze. Take from England her pasture lands and her livestock business would be almost a thing of the past. Take from the farmers of the United States their pastures and livestock and our whole agricultural structure would fall. It is seldom appreciated how large a part grazing and pastures play in our farm practices, or how much of our animal production is due almost wholly to pasture lands.

To the uninitiated the word "pasture" implies grass as the one food for the grazing animals. This is not always the case, however. Pasturage is defined by students of the subject as follows:

"Pasturage includes all herbaceous feed gathered directly by domestic animals. When the plants are shrubs or trees the pasture is called 'browse.' Feed consisting of acorns and other nuts that have fallen from forest trees is termed mast. This term is also extended to include the berries of palm trees and the seeds of pine trees.'

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Horses on pasture as a rule are almost exclusively grass eaters. Cattle are more catholic in their tastes, eating grass, weeds, and browse, according to the character of the range. On the average range or pasture grass forms about 70 per cent of the feed of cattle, with browse next and weeds the last

resort.

On the other hand, sheep find fully 75 per cent of their forage in the socalled weeds, principally wild flowers and the succulent plants other than grass. The Minnesota Experiment Station discovered that out of 480 varieties of weeds in that State sheep ate no less than 430. Goats prefer browse, and under ordinary conditions will make their diet largely on that class of forage. Inasmuch as cattle form by far the greatest number of our grazing animals, it is evident that grass is the chief pasture and range plant in this country. by an illustrious son of the West, the late John J. Ingalls, United States SenaOne of the most inspiring as well as charming tributes to grass was written

tor from Kansas.

GRASS

"Next in importance to the divine profusion of water, light, and air, those three physical facts which render existence possible, may be reckoned the universal beneficence of grass. Lying in the sunshine among the buttercups and dandelions of May, scarcely higher in intelligence than those minute tenants of that mimic wilderness, our earliest recollections are of grass, and when the fitful fever is ended, and the foolish wrangle of the market and the forum is closed, grass heals over the scar which our descent into the bosom of the earth has made, and the carpet of the infant becomes the blanket of the dead.

1 Year Book, Dept. Agr., 1923, p. 365.

43213-25-PT &

1579

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