1885.] LETTERS TO THE EDITOR. Gl 



i^ETTERS TO THE ^DITOR. 



GROWTH OF GRASS AAWNG TREES. 



SIR, — Would you be so kind as favour me with your opinion 

 whether you consider it to the advantage of ordinary park 

 trees that the grass be allowed to grow up amongst them, or that 

 it is better the surface be made liare and the trees dug amongst ? 

 Trees say from 12 to 15 feet high. John AVilson. 



Leazes Pakk, Newcastle City, 

 2%th March 1885. 



[When trees have attained a height of 12 feet, and are growing 

 vigorously, the growth of grass among them can do no harm ; so 

 long as it is mown once or twice a year, and is not allowed to 

 become overrun with coarse and noxious weeds. To keep the 

 surface bare among such trees, and to dig the ground, will result in 

 doing more harm than good, by destroying the best feeding roots 

 near the surface, and sending those left deep into the subsoil where 

 they seldom thrive. Among newly-planted park trees, it is bene- 

 ficial to keep the surface clear of grass and rank weeds for a year or 

 two, till their roots have taken possession of the soil and their tops 

 have grown up out of danger of being smothered by rank vegetation. 

 The weeds should be kept down by a free use of the hoe ; and if 

 the soil requires stirring, it is much better to do it with a fork than 

 a spade, so as to avoid as much as possible injury to the pushing 

 young roots of the trees. — Ed.] 



A GRAND SIGHT. 



SIE, — Last Boxing-Day, I made ray way some thirty miles into 

 the country, on purpose to see a tree felled. 

 The men were hard at work, sawing and wedging, when I reached 

 the spot — ^just within the walls of a noble duke's park. It was an 

 immense cedar tree — fully (I measured it with the tape I had 

 brought with me when cut down) 80 feet long, with two limbs 

 each 50 feet, and 20 feet round the base; and the tree, if I am 

 right in presuming each separate ring shown when felled to count 

 as one year, was 115 years old. Never did I feel that a day's 

 outing had been so well repaid. — Yours respectfully, 



W. King. 



