844 The yournal of Forestry. 



three weeks and turn over the bark, so'as to admit the air more freely. 

 In a week or ten days afterwards what is well cured of it I put into a 

 rick or stack. 



I build my rick also in an ojien airy place, where it will catch the 

 wind. The rick should not be more than seven feet broad at the bottom. 

 A long narrow bark rick is much to be desired ; additions can always be 

 made to the length without interfering with what is already put up ; the 

 only points to be observed in building a rick are to keep the heart well 

 filled with the best saved material, and to give the pipe-like outside a 

 downward tendency, which prevents the lodgment of rain-water. The 

 top of the rick should be as perpendicular as possible, and may be pro- 

 tected with spruce branches or ferns. 



Chopping bark is now done with machinery. A chopper is an exact 

 imitation of a chaff-cutter with round smooth feeding rollers, and is 

 driven by a donkey or a mule. Tanners generally buy the bark in the 

 rick, and chop it themselves. 



Instead of being particular with the time for beginning peeling oak, 

 I think we ought to be more exact than we are with the period when 

 to leave off. When the trees get into their full vigour of growth the 

 sap is highly rarefied, and being volatile, the bark suffers from extreme 

 evaporation. I endeavour to finish all cutting of oak by the middle of 

 June, and I am always very careful not to allow the bark to get bleached 

 with the rain, or dried up with the sun beating upon it. 



ForvEsi' SiiEus i'KOM California. — The systematic efforts at forest planting that 

 several foreign Governments have entered upon are the source of a new trade 

 from this country. An export of forest tree seeds from California has been 

 established amounting to $10,000 per year. The principal purchases are made 

 for Germany, Austria, England, and the colonies in Australia and Nevr Zea- 

 land; at present the demand exceeds the supply. The seeds of the Oregon 

 pine, known also as the yellow fir, are most sought ; the timber of that tree 

 is as good as British oak for shipbuilding, and has been found sound after 18 

 years' use for this purpose. The South Sea colonies are planting the Cali- 

 fornia redwood tree extensively. 



Large Beech Tree at Gormanstown Castle. — A correspondent of the Irish 

 Gardener's Record gives the dimensions of a very fine beech tree growing in 

 the demesne of Gormanstown Castle, co. Dublin. The trunk at six feet from 

 the ground measures something over ten feet, and immediately above that 

 height it forks into a number of branches, the horizontal ones radiating 

 symmetrically from the trunk for some 18 feet, at which point they touch the 

 ground, on which they rest for a nearly equal length, before turning up and 

 again assuming a horizontal position. The circumference of the branches is 

 299 feet, and the height, as near as he could judge, from 85 to 90 feet. The 

 tree is in a healthy condition, and yearly adding to its already ample proper 

 tions. 



