Land Use and Wildlife Resources (1970) / Chapter Skim
Currently Skimming:
3 New Patterns on Land and Water
3 New Patterns on Land and Water
Pages 55-91
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From page 55... ...
Farmers harvested 34 million fewer acres in 1967 than in 1950, and farm employment declined by 5 million persons in the 1 7-year period. The small subsistence farm is rapidly passing out 55
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From page 56... ...
Thus, the area is now in various stages of reversion to forest, and its wild fauna is changing accordingly. The foregoing trends, accepted without further inquiry, sometimes lead city dwellers to the specious conclusion that our agriculture is undergoing a national decline.
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From page 57... ...
. Thus, an area equivalent to 80 percent of the cultivated land in the Corn Belt was added to land available for producing human food.
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From page 58... ...
. Who owns and manages the land has important implications in the long-term outlook for soil and water conservation as well as for other values not associated with immediate returns.
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From page 59... ...
Improved land management and greater industrial values reduce the economic position of wildlife, which, in most cases, depends in part on the presence of uncropped areas and semipermanent types of vegetation (see Chapter 41. These essentials of the wildlife habitat are being wiped out by the efficient technology that is taking over our best soils.
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From page 60... ...
Federally financed programs dealing with soil and water conservation problems on a national scale have profoundly influenced practices and attitudes as they relate to land use. Extensive knowledge of land capabilities, collected over the past three decades, serves as a guide in determining the wisest and most profitable use for a given tract of land.
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From page 61... ...
Irrigated land on farms throughout the United States totaled more than 37 million acres in 1964. Seventeen western states accounted for more than 33 million acres.
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From page 62... ...
But much of the 9-million-acre increase in land irrigated between 1950 and 1965 in the 17 western states also comprised land previously cropped under dry-land conditions. In the most arid states-New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, and Nevada-the irrigated area increased from 2.7 to 3.0 million acres between 1950 and 1965, and most of this represents "new" cropland.
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From page 63... ...
Compilations of the Agricultural Research Service indicate that nearly 100 million acres of agricultural land had been "reclaimed" by drainage by 1960-more than 3 times the area made available by irrigation. In the United States there are still some 172.5 million acres of level, or nearly level, land that need group drainage outlets if they are to be used efficiently for cropping (U.S.
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From page 64... ...
In the humid eastern half of the United States, it has been common practice to invoke the authorities of local drainage districts to dredge the outlets of natural lakes to expose areas of organic soil for cultivation. Through the same process, marshes large and small have progressively disappeared.
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From page 65... ...
By the end of 1953, when this subsidization was withdrawn, payments had been made to one out of every four farms in the state, affecting the drainage of 1,692,750 acres.... Combining these figures, we arrive at a total of over two and one-half million acres, or 4,075 square miles.
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From page 66... ...
This paradox arises from a change in the census definition of a farm rather than from actual shifts in land use. Once an-entire farm is converted to forest, the acreage of woodland is no longer shown as a part of "woodland in farms" but is included in the total forest land acreage.
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From page 67... ...
Much of the land involved is subject to periodic flooding, making it uncertain for crop production. This is an example of destruction of a forest resource in short supply and elimination of excellent wildlife habitat for immediate economic return.
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From page 68... ...
. According to the national inventory of soil and water conservation needs of 1965, the shift of land use from forest to grassland in the period 1958-1975 is expected to be 14 million acres and from grassland to forest 6 million acres, resulting in a net change of 8 million acres.
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From page 69... ...
Unfortunately, high prices and demand for wheat during World War lI negated this conservative trend and resulted in even further destruction of range. Statistics related to land use on a national scale tend to conceal significant regional changes.
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From page 70... ...
stated: "It is our small cities that are the most lavish users of land; half of all the land used for urban purposes is in cities of less than 25,000, although such cities contain but one fourth of the urban population." He predicted that growth of this kind to the year 2000 would be particularly significant in the West where the 2~/: million acres now used for urban purposes would become 8/ million acres. He noted that th areas taken over would include some of the most productive agricultural lands, especially irrigated valleys.
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From page 71... ...
However, the amount of water stored in natural lakes, exclusive of the Great Lakes, which hold an estimated 5,500 cubic miles of water, is much greater than the quantity in all our artificial reservoirs (Bue, 1 9631. The smaller freshwater lakes are better known as recreation sites than for their contributions to economic development.
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From page 72... ...
Of this acreage, 63.5 million acres were categorized as inland fresh water and 1.6 million acres as inland saline water, the remainder being coastal water and wetland areas. It is estimated that, originally, the natural wetlands of the 48 contiguous states totaled 127 million acres.
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From page 73... ...
A1though the data are scattered, they show clearly that the problem warrants attention. Between 1954 and 1963, an estimated 45,000 acres of tidal wetlands from Maine to Delaware were lost; 20 square miles of Tampa Bay, Florida, have been filled and converted into residential
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From page 74... ...
Most of these people, and many others who live far inland, use recreation facilities along the nation's seashores. The Outdoor Recreation Resources Review Commission (1962)
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From page 75... ...
Flood control on some of our major river systems has been a matter of public concern for over a century. Greenshields ( 1964)
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From page 76... ...
Since the beginning of this century, flood losses have averaged about $200 million annually, with great variability. Despite the spending of billions of dollars on structural measures since passage of the Flood Control Act of 1936, the yearly cost of destruction by floods has continued to increase (Holmes, 19611.
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From page 77... ...
The framework of enactment and environment of operation are insufficient to fulfill their publicized and appropriate role in the family of flood-damage-prevention methods. A critical factor in the continued unrealistic and uneconomic management of flood plains is the type of justification being used by the Corps of Engineers for flood control works.
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From page 78... ...
A growing body of public opinion recognizes that the damming of every stream for power or flood control is not desirable. It is being increasingly recognized that there are many reasons for preserving diversity in the human environment.
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From page 79... ...
Half of the states have no natural lakes as large as 10 square miles in area, but more than three fourths have reservoirs of that size or larger, and all have some impoundments. The surface area of all our artificial reservoirs-more than 23,000 square miles-is nearly double that of the large natural lakes exclusive of the Great Lakes.
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From page 80... ...
Water from the reservoirs, when used for irrigation, has converted semidesert country into farm land, which inevitably eliminates some wildlife forms and enables others to multiply. In the case of reservoirs constructed in connection with large-scale multipurpose river basin development, we may note here that, while the purposes to be served will have a terminal economic life, either because the storage reservoirs will silt up or because of the likelihood of eventual technological obsolescence, the damage done to the natural environment through the construction of permanent works is likely to be lasting.
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From page 81... ...
Other prairie chickens now are greatly reduced and on the endangered list. Probably the tall grass prairies were optimum range, at least for the greater prairie chicken, but today the bulk of remaining habitat is in the mixed grass region, where the land is too sandy or hilly to farm.
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From page 82... ...
Efforts are being made by the National Park Service, the Bureau of Sport Fisheries and Wildlife, and others to preserve the ferret and its prey as part of the quasiprimitive ecosystem in parks and natural areas. The Gulf coastal prairie, including the part in Texas that supports remaining populations of the endemic and endangered Attwater prairie chicken, is undergoing extensive conversion to agriculture (especially grain sorghum and cotton)
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From page 83... ...
With technical guidance available, some landowners are willing to manage these birds at their own expense. To this end, renewed research efforts are now under way The Attwater prairie chicken program illustrates the kind of organized effort that will be necessary if other endangered habitats and wildlife are to be salvaged on at least a token basis.
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From page 84... ...
A National Park Service research plan (Robertson et al., 1966) describes the situation well: For centuries the sheet of fresh water moving southward over the Everglades from Lake Okeechobee, flowed through sawgrass areas of the Park and entered the Gulf of Mexico through a labyrinth of mangrove-lined rivers and creeks.
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From page 85... ...
Problems have multiplied since the creation by Congress of the Central and South Florida Flood Control District in 1948. This agency, the Corps of Engineers, and the National Park Service are now coordinating studies of water control and allocation problems in the hope that adequate provision can be made for the everglades, in which a nationwide public interest has become manifest.
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From page 86... ...
If of national significance, such areas qualify for registration under the Natural Landmarks Program of the National Park Service. The most important step in this field was made in 1964 with passage by the Congress of the Wilderness Act.
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From page 87... ...
PUBLIC LANDS FOR PUBLIC PURPOSES A great ideal of the first settlers of North America was to build homes on land that was their own. They knew well the conditions in Europe where the Crown and a privileged nobility held great tracts and commoners little or nothing.
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From page 88... ...
For the future, it is likely that most acquisitions will be in the East, and those in the West will be more than offset by the transfer of lands now under the jurisdiction of the Bureau of Land Management to state and private ownership. The extent to which the 480 million acres of the public domain will remain in federal ownership or be transferred to the states or other interests may depend upon recommendations to the Congress by the Public Land Law Review Commission This commission studied existing statutes and regulations as well as policies and practices of administrative agencies relative to the retention, management, and disposition of federal lands.
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From page 89... ...
National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior, Washington, D.C.
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From page 90... ...
W.1968. The Attwater prairie chicken, current status and restoration opportunities, p.
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From page 91... ...
1966. Everglades National Park natural sciences research plan.
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