THE BATTLE FOR CONSERVATION

...According to the authoritative Population Reference Bureau, if present trends continue there will be 260 million people in the United States by 1980 and 350 million by the year 2000...

...They prevent the settling of organic matter in sewage treatment plants, foam up and overflow into streams, or are discharged directly, without treatment, and create difficulties for downstream water plants...

...Use of outdoor playgrounds by the public increases in geometric—not arithmetic—ratio as population grows, the work week shortens,, and paid vacations lengthen...

...The potential supply of water that falls on the land and is available in surface and subsurface storage remains constant, but our needs pyramid with growing population...

...Municipalities and industrial plants are discharging organic, chemical, and mineral wastes into rivers and salt water bays at an alarming rate...

...A great nation which permits its natural resources to be frittered away can only decline in strength and dwindle in stature among the world's powers...

...Solutions to water supply problems often are too expensive for local communities not as rich as New York City or Los Angeles...

...While taking care of our rivers and water supplies, we must not neglect the forests...

...We have far from enough to accommodate the millions of wild ducks and geese and other migratory waterfowl that swoop down from the north every autumn and from the south every spring to find nesting and resting sites on lakes, ponds, rivers, and bays...

...The new reclamation policy enunciated by Secretary Udall should not only put more land under irrigation but alleviate the water shortages of many communities in the arid portions of the West...

...High yields of corn-belt farms are due mainly to lavish use of fertilizers and hybrid varieties rather than to fertility of soils robbed of many of their nutrients...

...The foam blows off sewage vats and sometimes scatters dangerous bacteria...

...The ultimate cost, borne by the state, will be $1,750,000,000...

...Now, hopefully, this trend will be ANTHONY NETBOY is a free lance writer who has been a student of conservation affairs for many years...

...It will cost money but we're going to see what we can do about it...

...At the same time, recreational use of the national forests, which more than doubled in the past decade, is threatening to overwhelm the Forest Service...

...The record on reforestation of Federal lands that contain the bulk of our sawtimber reserve has been shockingly poor in recent years...

...At long last, there is hope, too, for a dedicated wilderness system, advocated by the late Senator Richard L. Neuberger and others...

...Many of our national parks, like Yosemite and Yellowstone, with their fatal beauty, are taking a beating from overuse...

...At the same time, poor farming and grazing practices and improper logging are causing silt, the product of erosion, to flow into our streams...

...We can no longer take pure water for granted...

...In 1900, about the time the conservation movement was launched, the United States had a population of 76 million people...

...Thus, average daily use for all purposes jumped from 600 gallons per capita in 1900 to 1,300 gallons in 1955...

...Natural resources are the ultimate basis of our wealth and prosperity...

...Advocates of the wilderness bill, debated for years in Congressional committees and hearings around the country, are now hopeful of victory with a friendly Administration behind them...

...In a formal memorandum in February, Udall scrapped the "partnership" policy of hydroelectric development sponsored by the last Administration and initiated a Federal program of planning, constructing, and interconnecting generating plants to provide "an adequate supply of low-cost power for homes, farms, and industry sufficient to service a dynamic economy...

...The President is pushing the Cape Cod park...

...He directed that immediate attention be given to interconnecting the areas served by the Department of Interior's power marketing agencies—a dream of conservationists from Gifford Pinchot to Leland Olds which envisions low-cost electricity ultimately flowing in a gigantic ultra-high voltage grid from dams near the British Columbia border down to southern California...

...Unwise land use has permitted eroded materials to fill storage reservoirs, while overuse of ground waters or poor drilling practices have allowed salt water to invade formerly fresh supplies...

...Because of lack of water, about 50,000 acres of land have gone out of irrigation farming every year in Arizona since 1954...

...Allied to the need for more national parks is expansion of the system of wildlife refuges...

...Conservation-minded citizens watched helplessly as speculators acquired valuable areas of the public domain in the West and sold them at fabulous profits...

...A Senate subcommittee headed by Senator James E. Murray of Montana revealed last spring that the Forest Service, under mandate from the penny-pinching Budget Bureau, has fallen far behind, not only in reforesting its unstocked lands but in replanting areas devastated by fire...

...The Forest Service has warned that "the nation has no excess of forest land...

...reforestation of our national forests reduced to a snail's pace...

...But in many areas demands for clean, fresh water are outstripping the supply, either because of soaring consumption, or because available water has been rendered unfit for use...

...We have made considerable headway in reducing pollution from industrial plants, especially by pulp and paper companies (some of the worst offenders), but new chemicals that come into use and are discharged into the streams create new problems...

...Gullies and chasms still yawn in the badly eroded sections of the cotton South...

...Higher capacity wells now have to go down about 1,500 feet, and the water supply ends at 2,100 feet...

...It has identified 6,868 municipal and 5,728 industrial waste disposal systems which should be built at once...

...only a slight reduction of the total volume of muck and silt carried by Wisconsin streams...

...We will need much more electricity, timber, clean water, crop and grazing land, parks and other outdoor recreation facilities...

...crucial hydroelectric sites like Hells Canyon on the Snake River turned over to private development on a pigmy scale...

...There's a definite limit on what can be had and prices are going up," he said...

...If we do not move rapidly to solve them, timber, water, food, and fiber will become more scarce and expensive, and un-marred landscapes rare...

...The problems of conservation are numerous and complex...

...New Haven, Bridgeport, Long Island, Baltimore, Galveston, and Los Angeles have had to cope with sea water in their wells, while in Mississippi, Texas, Oklahoma, and Louisiana oil wells bring up salt water, and so do industrial wells in Ohio and Michigan...

...Along with the water, forest, and soil conservation problems that beset the nation is the crisis in outdoor recreation facilities...

...To obtain enough water for their inhabitants and industries, cities have to go farther and farther to tap sources of supply...

...Some 2.5 billion pounds of insoluble detergents are sold annually for household use...

...President Kennedy's long-range resources proposals have presented to Congress a challenging program based on an obviously deep and appreciative understanding of the problems facing our rapidly expanding population, not only now but in generations to come...

...reclamation of arid Western lands sharply tapered off by a policy of no new starts...

...But in the same period the potential pollution load jumped from 1,540,000 to 2,350,000 pounds...

...Since nature has endowed the United States with finite resources, we must use all we have in the most productive manner and at the same time take measures to restore those we are rapidly using up...

...The enormous productivity of American agriculture hides the fact that much of our farm land suffers from various degrees of debility...

...If passed, it would put the remaining gems of wilderness into an irrevocable system like the national parks...

...Precious supplies have been impaired by careless disposal of human and industrial wastes that contaminate rivers and streams...

...Many rivers around metropolitan areas are little more than running sewers, especially during periods of low flows...

...We either acquire it in the next five years or we aren't going to do it...

...In most metropolitan sections of the United States there are currently no shortages, but water becomes more expensive because of the increased lift...

...Awaiting action by Congress are bills to put some ten unspoiled coastal landscapes into the national park system, notably the Lake Michigan Dunes, Cape Cod, Point Reyes in California, and the Oregon Dunes...

...park-worthy areas around the country from the bulldozers of highway builders and land developers, we must act quickly...

...The Soil Conservation Service estimates that only one-third of our farm lands are adequately protected by soil conservation measures...

...The rundown condition of the public domain has long been an issue, but the Eisenhower Administration was rather apathetic...

...Some states have strong control laws, but others do not...

...Udall has also announced that no more applications for lands in the public domain will be accepted from private individuals until September 1, 1962...

...If we are to save many scenic and...

...Raw sewage naturally grows in volume as population increases...

...in 1960 there were 179 million...

...Congested New York City's predicament is almost as great as Los Angeles...

...Coming in rapid succession, these pronouncements have heartened conservationists who are deeply concerned about the state of our natural resources and who are aware of the complex problems generated by the rapid growth of our population...

...Enlightened statesmanship by the Kennedy Administration, forecast by the President's proposals and Secretary Udall's concrete actions, can return the conservation movement to high gear...

...On the contrary, further significant reductions in the acreage of land devoted to growing trees should in general be avoided or should be made with full realization that such withdrawals may adversely affect future timber supplies...

...Secretary Udall has promised more soil and water conservation on public grazing lands, possibly financed out of increased grazing fees, which have long been scandalously low...

...Detergents, for instance, are an almost insuperable obstacle to pollution control...

...Milwaukee, Wisconsin, for instance, has witnessed a decline of 400 feet in its well levels in eighty years because of overpumping...

...Udall has expressed enthusiasm about such seashore parks and is expected to endorse some of the seashore bills...

...our world position will be endangered if we do not attack conservation problems with vigor and a clear vision of our ultimate needs...

...Communities without adequate treatment plans pour it directly into the nearest stream...

...Since even these sources are inadequate, a plan has been launched—endorsed by the voters last autumn—to bring water from northern California by means of an intricate system of aqueducts, tunnels, and storage dams, across the mountains and through the valleys to southern California...

...Secretary of the Interior Stewart Udall's policy announcements indicate a return to the conservation philosophy of Presidents Franklin D. Roosevelt and Harry Truman...

...Even "Mission 66," a ten-year program launched by the National Parks Service in 1956 to modernize and expand park facilities, is now regarded as totally inadequate...

...The Public Health Service has estimated it will cost $9 to $12 billion to clean up the nation's rivers and billions more to keep them unpolluted...

...The 14,500,000 acres in wilderness, nearly all under Forest Service control, are now at the mercy of adminstrative fiat...

...Congress in 1948 passed the Water Pollution Control Act which provides for matching Federal grants to local communities to build sewage treatment plants, but the program is far too small, and the Eisenhower Administration's insistence that water pollution was strictly a local problem (even in rivers crossing several state boundaries) served to keep the program stunted...

...Agricultural areas are also suffering from overpumping...

...The Bureau of Land Management says that half the public range lands—eighty-five million acres—face "critical" to "severe" erosion and another fifty million acres are "moderately eroding...

...In 1930, treatment removed 530,000 pounds of polluting material from Wisconsin waters...

...They would remain majestic and isolated, accessible only on foot or horseback...

...The Battle for Conservation by ANTHONY NETBOY After eight long years of defeat and frustration, the battered forces of the nation's conservationists have been rejuvenated with excitement and new hope by the Kennedy Administration's vast programs to protect and develop the nation's resources...

...Udall's department is working on a plan for Federal acquisition of wetlands to be converted into wildlife refuges and also to make available loan funds to the states for this purpose...

...No roads, trails, or human use would be allowed...

...reversed if the new Administration follows up its encouraging opening moves...

...Overpumping has also reduced ground water levels in Philadelphia, Chicago, Memphis, and even in newer Western cities like Cheyenne, Wyoming, and Tucson, Arizona...

...Thus, from 1950 to 1959 some 950,000 acres of commercial national forest areas were burned but only 230,000 acres were replanted...

...President Kennedy has urged Congress to support a bill to extend the program's scope by $125 million each year for 10 years...

...Yielding to pressure by the lumber and pulp and paper interests hungry for timber, the Forest Service in recent years has opened up sizable primitive areas to the loggers, notably in the high Cascades of Oregon and Washington...

...And none too early...

...Chain-saw men are—or soon will be—cutting down trees in formerly untrodden wilderness, scarring the green slopes with roads, bulldozers and high lead cables, destroying the natural symphony of mountains, glaciers, and running streams...

...The United States has been basically transformed from a land of fields and forests in the early Twentieth Century into a country of industrial and metropolitan centers...

...In short, the soil conservation job is enormous...

...The United States, in its pristine state, was half clothed with forests that were regarded by the pioneers as inexhaustible, but now we are in danger of becoming a have-not nation...

...Less than a month after taking office, the President and his Secretary of the Interior, Stewart Udall, had already begun to reverse the Republicans' negative, corrosive policies which in two Presidential terms had brought conservation and resource development to a virtual standstill...

...Dust still blows over large areas of wheat land in the Great Plains during dry cycles...

...There is, in the aggregate, plenty of water in the United States...

...He's for the whole idea of expanding the park system...

...Per capita use, it estimated, will rise from sixty-five cubic feet in 1952 to seventy-six cubic feet and overall potential demand from twelve to twenty-two billion cubic feet by the year 2,000...

...By 1975 the country will be using 1,800 gallons of water a day for every man, woman, and child...

...Expanding industry and higher standards of living - steadily boost the amount of water required to satisfy the American way of life...

...This population surge, combined with rapidly rising living standards, is placing a destructive strain on our natural resources which can be relieved only with bold and far-sighted conservation and development...

...In its thorough review of the timber situation in 1955, the United States Forest Service foresaw no real decline in consumption of wood and wood products in the next forty years, despite the increasing popularity of substitutes like plastics and light metals...

...Simultaneously President Kennedy told the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association that the Administration is going "to make new starts now on reclamation projects," and "seek ways to assure an abundant supply of electric power at lowest possible cost for all rural people, and to help people use that power effectively to raise productivity and their standards of living...

...It already has spent $1,250,000,000 to tap three watersheds...

...During the business- and profit-minded Eisenhower Administration the nation saw the Federal program of multi-purpose river development slowed down or halted in most parts of the country...

...Over three centuries of settlement have sadly reduced the timber supply...

...Shortly after announcing the Administration's new power policy, which also promises vigorous support for the rapid development of low-cost nuclear power, Udall promised the National Reclamation Association "a stronger and more aggressive reclamation program" during the next four years...

...While the problems of gaining access to usable water sources are staggering for many localities, pollution threatens to become a national menace...

...Arizona, growing faster than any of the states except California and Florida, must look to the Federal government to build big storage dams to supply its thirsty cities and irrigated farms...

...For example, Wisconsin has had a good pollution law since 1927, and is doing more than most states to cope with the problem...

...A quarter century of aggressive action has resulted in...

...The fight against pollution is never-ending...

...and the soil conservation movement stymied by the decentralizing of the Soil Conservation Service, which was turned over largely to the states...

...Los Angeles and its surrounding communities, located in an area of very little rainfall, reach out all the way to the Colorado River, 450 miles away, Mono Lake, 350 miles, and the Owens River, 240 miles, for their water supplies...

...in 1954, 1,410,000 pounds...

...Total visits to the national parks soared from thirty-three million in 1950 to about sixty million in 1959...

...Perhaps the foremost urgency in our resources problems is the dwindling water supply...

...wildlife refuges opened to widespread oil drilling...

...Yet the myth of inexhaustibility dies hard...

...In 1948 farmers tapped water at 100 feet but now have to go down to 250 feet...

...This moratorium, he said, will give the Bureau of Land Management an opportunity to study the 60,000 applications now on file and should stop the scandalous speculation in public lands...