384 LETTERS TO THE EDITOR. [March 



Betters to the Editor. 



THE CUTTING AND HARVESTING OF OAK BARK. 



SYR, — Having had more than forty years' experience in the cutting 

 and liarvesting of oak bark, perhaps you will allow space in 

 your interesting pages for a few remarks on that subject. The 

 season for cutting oak intended to be peeled, varies according to the 

 locality and mildness of the weather. I have known stripping 

 commenced in March, but the usual time for timber is the middle 

 of April ; but coppice-wood — which yields the most valuable bark 

 — rarely runs well till May. The appearance of the brown bud is 

 a good guide for the commencement of the work, and bark peeled 

 at this stage is always the heaviest and most valuable ; but the 

 stripping season generally lasts a month or five weeks, where there 

 is a large fall of timber. The best mode of testing a tree is, — first, 

 try the branches by breaking one off; if the bark slips easily, you 

 can then insert the " peeler " — a steel instrument with a round 

 mouth and one side flat, the other convex — in the trunk ; if the 

 sap is well up, you will hear a crackling sound as soon as this tool 

 gets well under the V)ark : you may then proceed to get your tree 

 down as cj[uickly as possible ; but on no account take any bark off 

 the tree till you are sure it is fit to fall, for should a current of cold 

 air mi.x; with the sap, it -nill materially impede the circulation. On 

 a tree in a fit .state to come down, the first process is to chop 

 through the liark all round it close to the ground, then do the same 

 2 feet G in. from the ground ; after this, take this length of bark care- 

 fully off in pieces from a foot to 1 8 inches wide with the " peeler." 

 Lengths should be laid aside for covering your rank of bark, and a 

 good workman always has his bark carefully chopped in lengths from 

 2 feet to 2 feet C in. long ; but the fasliion of late years has been 

 to strip the liark without chopping, which is false economy, as the 

 bark presents a ragged appearance, and is more difficult to rank, 

 load, and rick. Now a word about drying. Thirty years ago there 

 was no such thing known as " bedding " of bark : all was ranked, — i.e., 

 some short forked sticks were cut out of the branches and driven into 

 the ground 6 feet to 8 feet apart; some poles were laid in these forks 

 to run parallel with the ground about 15 in. to 18 in. from it ; the thin 

 and bough bark were placed one end onthe ground and the otheragainst 

 the pole, leaving 6 in. to 9 in. projecting above the pole. When 

 the long bark is thus placed on both sides, two or three rinds thick, 

 all the short bits broken in peeling should be placed on the top of 



