424 EEPOET ON LAECH FOEESTS. 



purposes as hurdles, or sheep flakes, posts to wire fencings, &c. T 

 it is surprising that neglect or want of skill is so prevalent in 

 plantations of larch. It is a tree that cannot exist in a healthy 

 or vigorous state without a large display of foliage ; for the 

 massiveness of its bole, its vigour, and its permanence are in 

 direct proportion thereto .* Where larches are grown for the 

 sake of small timber, such as hop-poles, sheep flakes, or fence- 

 wood, it is necessary to have them closely planted, and by con- 

 finement adapted for the intended purpose ; but it is a mistake 

 to suppose that plantations trained for such purposes, with a 

 space between the trees of only three, four, six, or eight feet, 

 where they must be drawn up, destitute of lateral branches to a 

 great height by confinement, can ever be profitably cultivated for 

 the more important purposes of heavy timber, such as ship- 

 building or for railway sleepers. All heavy larch timber requires 

 early thinning and ample space ; and it is easy to see when the 

 trees approach so close, to one another that they begin to weaken 

 and subdue their side branches. It is then that thinning is in- 

 dispensable, if large timber is to be obtained. For want of timely 

 thinnings the plantations of Scotland are to a great extent com- 

 paratively worthless. The loss to the country arising from this 

 circumstance must be estimated anually at least by tens, if not 

 by hundreds of thousands of pounds sterling. The husbandman 

 who would fail to single out his turnips or mangolds, the crop of 

 only one season, would be talked of as worse than unskilful, while 

 the ruin of the crops of a lifetime is often passed by without 

 remark. A few practical details will place this matter in the 

 clearest light. 



From thirty to forty years ago I formed some extensive plan- 

 tations, and some of them I had not seen till very lately since 

 the time of their formation. One plantation in a remote quarter 

 I was anxious to inspect. It is now thirty-six years old, and 

 about twenty acres of it appeared to me to be composed of the 

 finest soil for larch I had ever met with, — I therefore planted 

 this portion of the ground with larches chiefly. With the view 

 of reporting on larch plantations, I lately visited this estate. 

 The spot in question formed a gentle slope in a ravine along the 

 banks of a mountain stream. The soil is a brown loam, of a good 

 depth, and the surface was of a thin peaty substance, overspread 

 with heathy vegetation. It was planted with two-year old larch 

 plants, with a slight mixture of about a fourth or fifth part of 

 Scotch fir. The plants were notch, planted nearly four feet 

 asunder, which gives nearly 3000 to the imperial acre. Judging 



* " A grove of crowded saplings, elms, beeches, or almost any deciduous tree, 

 when thinned, will throw out new lateral branches, and in time recover a state 

 of beauty; but if the education of the fir (or larch) has been neglected, he is 

 lost for ever." — Lander's Gilpin, vol. i. p. 173. 



