1885.] SYLVAN FEATURES OF CARMARTHENSHIRE. 215 



where they do not. The ash, although it springs up profusely on 

 enclosed woodlands where there are trees of its kind, like the oak, 

 does not do so very readily on open bare wastes. The seedling is 

 very liable to destruction from cattle and ground game. Where 

 there are masses of brambles, briars, and other bushes that afford 

 protection, its progress is more rapid. In tliis way native trees 

 spread over the glens and waste hollows of this western country, 

 and in many places the coppice-woods of to-day are the offspring 

 of such. 



Of late years these indigenous-woods are slowly disappearing, and 

 plantations of conifers, larch chiefly, are taking their place. Where 

 tliese plantations have been made with due regard to the rec^uire- 

 ments of the trees planted, the results have been satisfactory. It is 

 found, however, that the clay and sliale sulssoils of the district are 

 unsuited to the larch, and that it is unprofitable to allow a crop of 

 this tree to occupy the ground longer than forty years. Heart-rot 

 iuvarialily begins to affect it at that age. Larch, therefore, may be 

 said to arrive at maturity here at forty years. Notwithstanding 

 this short cycle of growth, fair returns are realized from it. 



Plantations wholly of larch are not so often made here of late 

 years as in the past. It seems to have been the only tree con- 

 sidered worth planting at one time, and believed to thrive on almost 

 any soil. Failures in many cases consequently followed. IMore 

 care as to its requirements is now exercised ; and Scotch fir, Laricio 

 Austriaca, ash, alder, etc., are generally mixed with it. These ever- 

 green conifers not only enhance the value of the plantations, of 

 which they form a part, by their timber-producing qualities, but by 

 the shelter wliich they afford other trees less adapted to withstand 

 exposui-e. Larch and other deciduous trees, when judiciousl}' mixed 

 with the Highland, Corsican, and Austrian pines, will grow fairly 

 well on ground where from exposure they would be sure to fail 

 alone. Indeed, but little can be done in the way of extending 

 plantations beyond the limits of sheltered glens and hollows 

 without them. Besides this, they redeem the character of a land- 

 scape in the winter from lifelessness. When death seems to reign 

 on every hand, the eye finds a resting-place in the green leaf of the 

 pine. More evergreen trees are a scenic want in this district. 



In the summer and autumn, there is not much to be desired in 

 the way of addition to the charms which nature imparts to the 

 woods and hedgerows. In summer, tree stems of grey and green, 

 with their vernal mantles of different shades, stand amid thickets of 

 brambles, Ijriars, hazel, holly, guelder rose, blackthorn, and woodbine. 

 Some of them wrapped in ivy, others speckled with star-like lichen. 

 There is the glossy green oak, the graceful ash, the dull alder, and 



