AMERICA'S DUST BOWL.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVIII, Issue 13, 16 January 1937, Page 7 (Supplement)

AMERICA'S DUST BOWL.

The United States of America, thoroughly alarmed at the rate al which the Dust Bowl of the Westert: States is becoming a desert, havt been ascertaining the extent of* tin damage. Tlie U.S.A. Agricultural Department report on the American Desert begins by an examination of tht Western Ranges. This area of 72 S.000,000 acres is two-fiftlis of all the land of the United States, and al but 1 per cent of it should be available for live stock grazing. But during the last 30 years three-quarter* of this vast area has greatly declined in value and usefulness, and only one-sixth of it has been improved by the stock farmers and squatters wliu own half of it. It is the unrestricted grazing over 523,000,000 acres which has damaged the soil, made bare the grassy places, and increased tlie J drynecs to a point where the grass cannot recover. Over these lands the erosion is so serious that they cannot be restored to their original'fertility for 1 50 years. The dry soil, too, drifts into the streams.. It will be 50 years before. the Western Ranges can support the 17,000,000 head. of stock they could carry till recently, and a century before they can support the 22.000,000 that America needs. —"Children's Newspaper."