The Forest Service is endeavoring to carry on a reforestation program
throughout much of the cut-over area in the Lake States and the Pacific
Northwest. One of the chief problems to successful reforestation
is the control of rodents, particularly the snowshoe hare. In the
Olympic Forest in Washington, the snowshoe hare has destroyed as much
as 40 percent and damaged 70 percent of the Douglas fir seedlings.
In Michigan and Wisconsin, it was necessary to carry on extensive
rodent-control operations to permit the seedlings to survive. Much of
this work would never have been possible but for E.C.W. help.
In the open area, jack rabbits have become a serious pest. The
Biological Survey, in 1934, received a petition bearing the signatures
of more than 8,000 individuals of eastern Colorado, requesting
Government aid in killing jack rabbits, which were ravaging the meager
stocks of forage left after drought and wind had taken their toll.
The Forest Service recognized that rodent control would be essential
if the Plains Shelterbelt program of planting trees from the Canadian
border to Texas was to be effective, and in 1935 approximately
one-tenth of its entire appropriation for the program was expended for
rodent control under the supervision of the Biological Survey. Crews
patrolled the planted areas constantly to prevent the gnawing of the
seedlings by jack rabbits and pocket gophers.