Here is one excerpt:

The data gathered upon cattle in this study have been divided into two classes, one showing the costs and methods of production on the prairie type of ranch and the other on the mountain type of ranch where the cattle have access to the national forest reserves and where as a rule the cattle are wintered in meadows, on alfalfa or native hay. The figures presented in this report are taken directly from the books by the various ranchmen and show actual expenses incurred in 1922.

Now, the report points out, among other things, the much higher loss of livestock by reason of poisonous plants. It takes into account all the lease rents paid, the feed bill, the labor, etc., and this is among the conclusions:

It cost the prairie ranchman, in actual cash outlay, $27.98 to produce a calf which was sold on the ranch for $21.50 in 1922. It cost the mountain ranches, in actual cash outlay, $31.68 to produce a calf that was sold for $25 per head in 1922. The prairie ranches thus sustained a loss of $6.48 per calf, the mountain ranches $6.68 per calf—

More on the mountain ranches, despite the fact that they sold for more

in addition to loss of interest on capital invested and return for the proprietor's labor.

(The other excerpts from the pamphlet entitled "An economic study of the cost and methods of range cattle production on 41 ranches in Colorado, 1922, 22,285 cows and their calves," by G. S. Klemmedson, presented by Mr. Tomlinson for the record are as follows:)

Table III shows the annual gross cost of carrying a cow on the mountain ranches to be $3.58 more than that on the prairie ranches, or $24.09. This higher cost is due principally to extra cost of feed and labor required in wintering cattle and extra cost of labor in handling cattle on the forest ranges. The net cost on the mountain ranches was $17.66 per cow. The hay raised is charged to cattle at actual cost of production. This table also shows that the cost of producing a 400-pound calf to weaning time, with an average calf crop of 56.7 per cent, was $43.22 gross cost, or a net cost of $31.68. The net cost being 73.3 per cent of the gross cost.

Seven ranches in the mountain area having an average of 72.7 per cent calf crop ran their breeding herd under fenced pastures or on fenced forest grazing land where breeding could be controlled. The balance of the ranches, 17 in number, had an average calf crop of 50.1 per cent and ran the breeding herd on the open forest range. Table XV shows that the seven ranches that ran the breeding herd under fence had a 22.6 per cent higher calf crop due to the method of handling the herd under the pasture system. This method of handling the breeding herd also reduced the death loss considerably. The 7 ranches running cows in pasture had an average death loss of 1.55 per cent on cows and 1.5 per cent on bulls, while the 17 ranches running on the open forest range had a death loss of 2.72 per cent on cows and 6.5 per cent on bulls.

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On some of the forest ranges the death loss was 2 to 6 per cent. Most of this was due to larkspur and other poisonous plants. Much of this loss can be avoided by fencing the worst patches, herding cattle away from them, or grubbing scattered larkspur. Other losses may be avoided by close supervision. Stock owners should be in constant touch with their cattle upon the range in order to prevent loss from straying, bogging down, black leg, bloating, and losses from predatory animals.

This report presents the results of cost of production studies and methods of management of range cattle in Colorado on 41 ranches giving data on 22,285 cows and 12,439 calves. The gross cost of carrying a range cow on

the prairie type of ranch was $20.51, and on the mountain type of ranch $24.09. The average calf crop on the prairie ranches was 56 per cent with the gross cost of raising a 350-pound calf to weaning time $36.66. The average calf crop on the mountain ranches was 566.7, and the gross cost of raising a 350-pound calf to weaning time $43.22.

The average size of the prairie ranches was 15,914 acres, of which 189 acres were in crops, with the average value per acre of deeded land $10.75. Of the total land 78.5 per cent operated was leased at an average rate of 7 cents per acre. The average size of the mountain ranch was 5,071 acres, 37.6 per cent of which was leased at an average rate of 20 cents per acre, the leased land being valued at $17.48 per acre. Forty-five per cent of the total ranch investment was in land on both prairie and mountain ranches.

The mountain ranches had a somewhat higher labor cost per calf than the prairie ranches due to extra labor required in feeding hay in winter and moving cattle to and from the forest reserves. The total labor cost per cow was $2.33 on the prairie ranches and $2.81 on the mountain ranches.

Mr. TOMLINSON. The point I wish to make from this report by Mr. Klemmedson-and it is the latest document issued by the Department of Agriculture on these relative costs-is that, notwithstanding what seems to many people as an extremely reasonable grazing fee on the national forests, nevertheless the mountion ranches did not do so well as prairie ranches where they did not have available grazing on the national forests.

Mr. Klemmedson's headquarters is supposed to be in Fort Collins. I tried to get in touch with him for the purpose of having him come before this committee and go into more elaborate detail as to his figures and conclusions. I received a wire from him before I left Denver to the effect that he was busy in Washington, having this prepared as a report of the Department of Agriculture, and he will be there until November 1. I would suggest if the committee desire any more data along this line that you call Mr. Klemmedson or Mr. Parr, who has been collaborating with him.

My own experience, gained from conversation with stock men throughout the entire west, fully confirms the conclusions drawn by Mr. Klemmedson from his investigation of these 41 ranches in Colorado. There is a prevailing impression among those who do not know that by reason of the seemingly low fees the stockmen in the mountain countries on the forest reserve ought to be making more money than elsewhere. It is not true.

ests.

I mentioned that there had been in recent years some criticism directed against the overregulation of grazing on the national forAnd that this, along with opposition to the threatened increase, constituted a large share of the present criticism in the national forests. I believe there is a well-grounded and well-justified criticism against the national forests for their methods of overregulation. I do not think it is economically sound that they should prescribe how much hay a man should put up before he should be entitled to certain rights for grazing on the national forests. I do not think a bureau of the Government should attempt to thus direct the private operations of stockmen.

I have felt a long while, and I think it is the view of a great many stockmen, that the regulation of cutting down the old permittees in order to accomodate newcomers was on a false basis. That you did not give to the newcomer any advantage; in fact, did him an injury, while obviously you injured the man who was cut down in the size of his permit. It did not mean and does not mean

that any more livestock is raised. It generally has spelt disaster to the small man.

It is an artificial condition created which no bureau of our Government ought to have the power to put into effect.

I think as a stabilization problem the privilege or right should be well-nigh perpetual, and that it should not be subject to any kind. of a cut to let a newcomer come on. It should be stabilized, for example, on the basis of the present occupants of the range. Any other method, artificial or otherwise, in my judgment would be uneconomic. If the present users find by buying out their neighbors they can increase the number of head they can run on an allotted area, so much the better both for them, and for the country at large, for it spells, in my judgment, a greater economy.

I think I can partly appreciate some of the tremendous problems confronting this committee. I think I can forsee some of the objections that might be raised to any plan.

I wish to record now, before I forget it, my great personal appreciation of the fact that the able members of the Public Lands Committee of the United States Senate have come out west and have so painstakingly and so exhaustively gone into this great question. It is a problem not entirely of the stockmen of the West. It concerns the entire West, and on their prosperity obviously depends the rest of the country.

So I think stockmen generally, as I do, want to favor something that is for the good of the entire West as well as their own industry. At the Salt Lake conference there was a committee representing all the different States appointed to draft a platform. Such a platform was finally agreed to. Partly compromise, but was almost unanimous. Now since the Salt Lake conference I have heard on the outside some little criticism of the suggestion or the demand of the stockmen that their right to grazing on these national forests be legalized, made permanent. I can understand that that term may seem somewhat offensive to those in the East not entirely familiar with the situation, but I still believe that anything short of that does not deal out to these stockmen in the West the measure of justice to which they are entitled.

In following the various statements made by Colonel Greeley you will recall that he has insisted that grazing on the national forest was the most permanent, unchangeable thing in all the livestock grazing conditions throughout the West. That stockmen got on the national forests and stayed there almost from the inception, and are there today. You have heard people say that they were in a certain locality before these national forests were established, and were there today. In effect in what Mr. Greeley said carelessly he intimates that they are entitled to this right. Now, why not legalize it?

As against the actual legal right to use these forest reserves, if that kind of a measure can not be put over by reason of opposition, I think the committee should go a long ways towards extending the tenure, not 10 years-make it 20 to 25 years. Now I hope the committe thoroughly appreciates the help that would give to the stockmen in the financing of their business. To-day, as has been testified before the committee, the mere fact that they are on there by sufferance or a litmited time, and may be thrown off has a very

potent effect on the ability of the stockman to adequately finance himself. I can see, I think, vastly more compensating advantages than any elusory or imaginary disadvantages that might flow from the failure to make this almost a permanent right.

Now there may be some other angles of the forest reserve that I will want to refer to, but I want to direct a few remarks to this public domain question. I believe the members of the committee who are here present know that the American National Live Stock Association during the past 25 years has at different times endeavored to secure some sort of regulation of the remaining unappropriated public domain. Our last effort along that line was the Kent bill, which was very decently interred about the time the 640acre homestead bill was enacted. Since then our association, without promoting any bill, has gone on record as being in favor of some regulation of the remaining public domain.

Now I do not believe the livestock industry of the west, as least not the majority of them, want this remaining public domain turned over to the States. I think they are overwhelmingly against it. It needs no argument on my part to point out to you the disaster that would immediately be encountered by the users of grazing on the national forests if the public lands were turned over to the States. The grazing on the national forests would be so disrupted that no stockman would know where he was at.

It certainly must be well known to the committee that stockmen using the national forest, to a large degree many of them also use the public domain. The administration of both ought to be in the hands of one department of the Government, if it is decided to regulate grazing on the remaining public domain.

I do not think the stockmen as a general rule care in which depart ment of the Government that control is lodged, whether in the Department of Agriculture or whether in the Department of the Interior. There are many good reasons for both departments, some of them particularly persuasive.

If it is the decision of Congress to regulate grazing on the public domain, I think it is obvious it should be in conjunction with the administration of grazing on the national forests.

Now, coming back to the national forests, I wish to make a few observations on the area plan which was recommended at the Salt Lake conference, and to again point out, even at the expense of reiteration, some of the advantages of that plan. I think it goes without saying that it would result in a better protection of the range, in greater economy on the part of the stockmen, in livestock coming off the reserves in better condition, and perhaps selling at a better price. I think it would result in a less expensive administration of these reserves if on an area basis. There would certainly not be the annoying restrictions and regulations which some stockmen have voiced before this committee.

The same basis should apply on the public domain-an area basis. Now I am not unmindful that in certain sections where the community allotment is in effect it may seem a little better to have a permit system, but I think on the whole the advantages of the area basis and, by the way, the Forest Service is rapidly veering to that basis-I say on the whole the area basis has vastly more advantages than the so-called permit system. It will do away with the

tremendous book of rules which the Forest Service has gotten out, and which, by the way, are pretty near unintelligible to some people. It would cut down the cost of administration. It would conserve the range, and give you better livestock.

In my letter to Colonel Greeley discussing the Rachford report I referred to the fact that the question as to fees had gotten to be so acute that it was time Congress announced some basis for fees on the national forests. And in that letter I expressed the view that something approaching the cost of administration basis was, in my judgment, fair and reasonable.

Now I am aware that a great many stockmen are fairly well satisfied with the present basis of fees. They feel that as the States receive back 25 per cent and an additional 10 per cent, that said return is of great benefit to their districts.

Then there is another angle to the fee question, and that relates to the much-needed and long-deferred improvements on the national forests. Stock could be run to greater advantage, the grass could be better conserved, many economies would flow therefrom if more improvements were put upon the reserves.

My own personal view on the matter is that the Forest Service ought to be reimbursed for the actual cost of administration, but no more. There are many persuasive reasons why the Government ought to stand that cost of administration without any fee, but I think on the whole the cost of the administration should be taken out of the fees. And all the balance, whatever it may be the judgment of this committee that the fees should be, should be returned to the States or grazing districts, either in percentage allotments for the schools or roads, or in the shape of improvements upon the various national forests.

Now in this rambling statement I have not attempted to cover all my views on the problem, but I feel I have taxed the patience of the committee as much as I should.

Senator JONES of New Mexico. I wish to say that the characterization of the witness' remarks by him as rambling I do not think is warranted by the record. To the contrary, I think the witness has made a very clear, concise, and forcible statement, which is much appreciated by us, I am sure.

Mr. TOMLINSON. Well, I hope you think more of it, Senator, than I do. I thank you. I will probably be at Albuquerque, if I can manage it, and I will certainly be in Washington later on, and may wish to submit a further statement. At all events, I want to be of assistance to the committee if I can. This is a tremendous question. You have got a hard task in formulating your ideas as to what is fair to all interests. I may be a little biased, although I try not to. The thing ought to be settled.

Senator CAMERON. Now.

Mr. TOMLINSON. And now is the time to settle it.

Now, Senator Jones, you know this leasing proposition has been up for 25 years in one shape or another. Some of the remarks made by you this morning I think I would have answered a little differently than the gentlemen did. These isolated sections scattered here and there throughout the West ought to be sold on some kind of a basis. But even when that is done, you have got close to 186,000,000