742 The Journal of Forestry. 



under the bark of the recently felled trees, prunings, or thinnings 

 which strew the ground. Fallen or dead trees, and their decaying roots, 

 are also the ascertained breeding-places of that most destructive of 

 insects to the fir tribe, the Pine Weevil Hylohius ahictis), which inflicts 

 such fatal injuries on young Scots fir plantations in many parts of the 

 country. These are only two of many well-known injurious insects which 

 are encouraged to multiply and extend their depredations by neglecting a 

 periodical clearance of plantations from dead wood, upon which these 

 and other injurious insects deposit their eggs and hibernate during the 

 winter. 



By taking the precaution to remove all such fallen wood from 

 plantations at this period of the year, before the heat of spring and 

 summer calls these insects into active life, multitudes of them are 

 carried away and destroyed, and the few that may be left are so 

 unseasonably disturbed that many of them die before they arrive at 

 maturity ; and consequently, the age of reproduction never being 

 reached, they gradually become less and less numerous, until they 

 become extinct altogether. If the contrary method of utterly ueg 

 lecting these necessary precautions is followed, which we regret to say 

 is by no means a rare occurrence, both insects and fungi increase and 

 spread at an alarming rate, and in favourable seasons inflict most 

 gi'ievous injury upon the plants in the woods and plantations. In 

 most instances severe outbreaks of insects, &c.,^ can be directly 

 traced to the neglect of some simple law of nature, by timely attention 

 to which all the evil that has been committed might with the simplest 

 means have been entirely prevented. 



It is thus seen that even although the refuse and debris of plantations 

 may not be saleable, or if it is the value may not pay the cost of 

 collecting, still, to insure healthy crops of trees and the best 

 quality of timber, it is really of the utmost importance that woods 

 ami plantations be gone over annually to clear them of all 

 fallen timber and decaying refuse. If the produce of the 

 clearing will not pay for removal, it ought to be gathered into 

 heaps in safe and convenient places, and burnt on the spot, so as to 

 get rid of it at the least cost, and prevent the occurrence of calamities 

 of a far more expensive nature. 



At a meeting of the Koyal Horticultural Society of London on 

 February 19, a very interesting collection was exhibited by Dr. Hogg, 

 of the varieties of Birch, Hornbeam, and Hazel, which are found grow- 

 ing in the woods and plantations in the Fouthern ooui ties, fspccially in 



