Page 393 - 1970S

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dying in this one forest. Smog is the
"Death Angel." Presently 82% of the
trees are moderately damaged, 15%
severely damaged and 3% are dead.
The needles of huge 80- and 100-year–
old ponderosa pines - and younger 40-
and 50-year-olds, too - are h1rning
yellow from ozone poisoning. After so
many needles die, the tree can no longer
make normal quantities of pitch, which
acts as a natural insect repe!lent.
Says Dr. Paul R. Miller, United
States Forest Service expert, "There is
no known method for restoring the
health of a smog-damaged tree, short of
placíng it in a filtered-air enclosure."
Instead of crash programs for clean–
iog up pollution nou;, cities are looking
for smog-resistcmt trees. Sorne species
aod hybrids can apparently live longer
in a polluted environment than others.
But there's no guarantee that these can
withstand smog indefinitely. And that,
after all, is not getting to the came of
the problem and its worldwide impact.
The pollution tragedy is not limited
to the United States. Tokyo's cherry
trees are dying from srnog. Norwegian
scientists are warning that unless air
and water pollution across European
national borders is halted, European
forests will be destroyed. Trees in Brit–
ain are dying.
Saigon, too, suffers from sorne 890,-
000 registered vehicles and the air pol–
lution created by them. In a city whose
streets were designed to handJe only
200,000 vehicles, trees are fa!ling victirn
to toxic soot-black exhaust of too many
cars.
Smog is a new type of "deforesta–
tion" agent - iodirectly laid to the
irresponsibility of man. But it is man's
direct deforestation, over thousaods of
years, which has created dust bowls,
erosion and flooding.
China's Yellow River
A dramatic example of deforestation
- and a tragic one indeed - occurs in
China.
Just one of China's former forest
areas, at the headwaters of the Yellow
River, has been so misused that the land
is ruined. It has become one of the
worst eroded regions in the world.
Swirling clown the Yellow River each
Th'e PLAIN TRUTH
year are sorne 2,500,000 tons of topsoil,
creating an aptly named Yellow Sea at
the mouth of the river. Most of this
erosion was directly triggered by the
deforestation of the land along the
headwaters of the streams flowiog ioto
the Yellow River.
The principie of cause and effect
is nowhere better illustrated than in
this wrong practice of wholesale
deforestation.
"Many of our serious water problems
"The empires of Babylon,
Syria, Persia, and Car–
thage were destroyed by
the advance of floods and
deserts caused by the in–
creasing clearing of for–
ests.11 Richard SI. Barbe Baker
have their roots in the misuse of land,"
stated a flood-control expert. He contin–
ued: "The same human activities that
aggravate water-shortage difficulties also
contribute to uncontrolled water sur–
pluses and al! the misery and destruc–
tion they bring in their wake.. ..
"We mmt begí11 tuhere the floods
begin. We must retard the runoff aod
reduce or prevent the loss of soil from
the watershed lands themselves, before
they have a chaoce to build up to
destructive potentials in the channels"
(T1'ees, the Yearbook of Agricttltttre,
U. S. Department of Agriculture, 1949,
Washington D.C., pp. 609-610).
Deforestation has tremendous effects
on the land involving water cydes, food
chains, and even the production of life–
giving oxygen.
The removal of forests affects the
weather and dimate of wbole nations
and continents. Today's hot, drying
winds coming from North Africa across
the Mediterranean dry out moisture over
Ttaly, creating the continually hot, dry
weather conditions and ever-blue skies.
This has not always been so. In
former days, ear ly Romans complained
of the balmy, cloudy conditions and of
frost and snow along the Italian
península.
How different a climate today! The
weather of other areas in Europe is
Decemoer 1970
affected by the drying winds off the
Sabara, once a rich, well-watered, pro–
ductive land.
Forest cover is very important in the
control and dispersa! of water, and for–
est cover is extreme/y critica/ to the ani–
mal life living under its shield.
T be Balance of Life
An acre of hardwood forest in the
eastern United States might contain
about 150 or more trees. In addition, if
a careful count were possible, there
would be some 10,000 saplings and
shrubs; 100,000 herbs ; 500,000 earth–
worms; one million soil mites; 250 tril–
lion fungi and astronomical numbers of
bacteria and other microorganisms.
Besides this host we would discover
insects, wireworms, nematodes, soil
algae, lichens and a thousand other
forms of life!
Look closer at the forest floor . Here
in a layer sorne 6 inches deep dwell
95% of all the life found in a forest.
Most of this Jife, of course, is micro–
scopic. However, in one square foot of
forest soil an observer once counted
1356 living creatures visible to the
naked eye!
What's the purpose of such a daz–
zling number and array of creah!res in
the forest floor? And what happens to
them when a forest is cut?
Herein is a story few people under–
stand . Yet, it is so important that man
should understand it before cutting
clown one single tree.
The forest floor is a factory for mak–
ing soil, for absorbing and holding
rainfa!l, and for numerous other jobs in
making this planet a fit habitat for man
and beast. On one acre of forest floor,
some 2 tons of animal and plant detri–
tus - Jeaves, twigs, limbs, animal
droppings, dead insects - fall each
year. In this way the forest is fertilized,
and its perpetuation is insured.
Befare this litter can be used by
growing plants and trees, it must first
be broken down into its component
parts. This is where the soil microbes
play an important part.
This litter is eaten and re-eaten . Al!
this eating occurs in a definite order
which creates certain layers within the
forest floor. Decomposition is not a