Fortunately, the E.C.W. program came at the most opportune time. The
extreme drought throughout the west had forced rodents from the open
lands into adjacent irrigated valleys and mountain meadows, where they
became especially objectionable in their competition with livestock
for the available forage. Livestock and rodents together, during dry
periods, have in many places almost entirely denuded the surface soil
of its vegetation. This has caused the beginning of sheet erosion in
areas where there would still be ample forage for livestock had it not
been for the excessive numbers of rodents. On many areas, grazing by
livestock and rodents combined has practically eliminated the native
grasses, and these are now being replaced with weeds and poisonous
plants. Damage in some instances has amounted to at least 75 percent
of the available forage, and the average loss has probably been
approximately 25 percent.
On some of the Indian reservations of the Southwest, the condition has
been pitiful. On the Navajo Reservation, in particular, the Indians
have carried on a losing fight against drought and rodents. It has
often been necessary for them to replant their corn three and four
times a season, since kangaroo rats and other native rodents dig up the
kernels as rapidly as they are planted. Prior to the spring of 1936,
there had been four years of drought, and this, coupled with rodent
damage, had reduced corn production to the point where the Indians had
barely enough for the spring seeding. All were clamoring for aid, and
in order to save their last crop of corn it was necessary to detail a
foreman with four or five E.C.W. Indians to go from farm to farm and
conduct rodent-control operations.