On the Native Forests of Aberdeenshire. 83 



these ; and if it is not generally known or remarked, that those 

 parts of our plantations of fir which are planted thin, continue ge- 

 nerally healthy in comparison with those that are ttuck, this arises 

 from the circumstance, that, upon the natural failure of a consider- 

 able number of trees in any part of a plantation, it is considered as 

 having reached its period of growth, and the salesman is sent into 

 it, who, to suit his customers, cuts the thick and thin planted trees 

 promiscuously, as they are required, and the latter have thus no 

 opportunity to evince their superiority. 



1 had various opportunities for noticing, on an estate named Bal- 

 moral, belonging to Lord Fife, on the south side of the Dee, oppo- 

 site to Crathy, that where the young native forests incidentally 

 come up too thick on the ground, the trees are subject to the same 

 early death that so generally overtakes those of our plantations. 



An unusual proportion of the young native trees are double, or 

 even triple. On examining them I was led to believe, although it 

 was often not easy to be sure, that they were not two or three lead- 

 ers from one root, but two or three distinct plants growing proba- 

 bly from the same cone. It is a great error not to single these 

 when they are quite young, as few of them promised serviceable 

 timber, and they probably die early, for I perceived few resenibling 

 them in the aged forests. If this be their fate, their numbers are 

 iso great as to make a great drawback in the produce. 



It is surely a correct induction from these facts, that the cause 

 of the fir trees of our plantations living so short a period in compa- 

 rison with those of the native forests, is the unfortunately prevail- 

 ing practice of planting them too thick in the ground. The proper 

 extent of the remedy to this evil, which is evidently to plant thin- 

 ner, will however admit of some discussion, and may perhaps, in 

 the end, be determined only by experience. 



On examining the few groups that occur among the large trees 

 at Haughton above described, to ascertain how they have filled the 

 ground, and what space has been necessary for their free growth, 

 it is apparent that, where most checked by each other in their late- 

 ral branches, they still require a free, space from stem to stem of 

 12 or 15 feet. At this rate 250 or 350 trees, were they all to ar- 

 rive at maturity, would be amply sufticient for a Scotch acre, in- 

 stead of the 2000 or 3000, or upwards, allowed by the present sys- 

 tem. It is evident that this great diminution of the number of 

 trees, would immensely diminish the expense of planting, — a mat- 

 ter very desireable where the returns are so remote as to this spe- 

 cies of outlay. But then it may be said that, if the trees are so 

 thinly planted at the beginning, there will be none to supply the 

 place of those who either die or are destroyed by accident. Let 

 us, in answer to this, examine our present young plantations, where 

 we scarcely ever see an example of natural death among the trees, 

 till they have become so large as to kill each other, — a case which 

 will never occur in the thin plantation ; and as to accidents, all 

 may be guarded against by proper fencing, excepting the breaking 



